This undated postcard of Duluth’s Lyceum Theatre does not appear to have been mailed, though it does have a message on the back.
Flavilla Barrett wanted Aunt Helen to know “it was very cold last night,” and wondered what the weather was like “down there” wherever Helen might have been. An inquiry is also made on the condition of Uncle Ed.
The Lyceum Theater opened at 423-431 W. Superior St. in 1891 for performances of operas, plays and vaudeville. In 1921 it became a movie house. The six-story building was designed by Oliver Traphagen and Francis Fitzpatrick, and financed by Duluth lumberman Andreas Miller. It was said to have the largest stage north of Chicago. It had three balconies and seated more than a thousand people.
The Lyceum was demolished in 1966 and replaced with the KDLH-TV studio. The KDLH building was demolished in 2015 and replaced by the Maurices headquarters.
The theatrical masks that once adorned the front of the Lyceum were moved to the Duluth Depot’s theater. The stone bronze lions from the stairway are now outside the Lake Superior Zoo. Those details are shown with the red circles in the photo below, which is a blowup of the one above, shot by Hugh McKenzie.
