Next meeting planned for Tuesday February 11 at the David A. Howe Library
By Kathryn Ross, Secretary
WELLSVILLE – After six months of meetings, what has been known as the movie theater committee has an official name, the Babcock Movie Theater Preservation Society Inc. and it will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday (Feb. 11th.) in the David A. Howe Library to continue the ongoing effort to restore the Main Street movie theater. Anyone interested in helping or being involved is encouraged to attend.
In January the committee selected a board of directors for the project. When they met again, a little later in the month, they baptized the committee, the Babcock Theater Preservation Society Inc. based on the responses to the recent poll conducted on The Sun website and elsewhere.
The survey asked which name the responder preferred for the movie theater and listed several recent names. Overwhelmingly the responders chose The Babcock. In total there were nearly 900 responses to the survey and 346 selected Babcock as their preferred name.
The theater opened at the turn of the century. From the mid-1920s to the late 1960s, it was known as the Babcock Theater. Generations of Wellsville people knew it by that name and reflected their fondness for the theater in the survey’s question number six, which asked them to recall their memories of attending the theater. Many of the memories listed are shared memories centering around viewing movies with family and friends, first dates, special occasions double features, midnight debuts, Friday nights and weekend matinees.
“It seems that there are a lot of people who want this theater open again and that they have a lot of the same memories,” said Barry Glickstein, who heads up the board of directors which includes Vice Director Tim Colligan, Secretary Kathryn Ross, Treasurer Kate Williams and Charles Lagreca. Cory Lunn and Jackie Comstock. Trustee Jeff Monroe is the group’s liaison to the village board. Trustee Mike Roeske is also involved.
The board believes those memories should be shared and is considering binding them and placing copies in the library, chamber of commerce and village office to be read by the public.
Currently the board is seeking 501(c)3 nonprofit status for the restoration and preservation project which has been pegged at a cost of between $250,000 and $300,000. The application has been forwarded to the state. The Village of Wellsville currently owns the building and last year worked to stabilize the structure with a new roof and addressed the electric and water systems utilizing funds from American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Covid funding).
Within the next few weeks, the Board of Directors will formalize its mission statement and look into funding sources and architectural consultants for the project. One founding member of the committee says she expects the movie theater to be opened later this year.
In the regular committee meeting on Tuesday, plans for cleaning, restoration, fundraising and programming will be among the topics discussed, at 6 p.m. in the David A Howe Library. Note, the meeting time is changed from previous meetings.
