Those times have changed. During the 1950s and '60s—the heyday of the Garden Theatre—a dollar could buy a ticket for two movies, a box of popcorn and some candy. In 2004, that same dollar barely gets a moviegoer much more than a down payment on a box of Milk Duds. And the Garden Theatre has long since closed its doors to movies.

When the Garden Theatre was built in 1949, it was an 11,000-square-foot movie palace that instantly became a downtown Willow Glen hangout for youth and adults. Many of today's Willow Glen residents have fond memories of watching Saturday matinees or weekday double features, but those past times wouldn't have been possible without the vision of Willow Glen residents A.J. and son James "Bud" Lima.

While Bud was away from Willow Glen in the mid-1940s, fighting in World War II, his father purchased the house and land where the Garden Theatre currently sits. When Bud returned from the war, the Lima men, along with two other partners, tore down the home and hired an architect and contractor to build the Garden Theatre. The entire project cost almost $300,000, which would be the equivalent of $2.3 million in today's marketplace. Bud was especially proud of the many ornate fixtures—murals and carvings—featured in the Garden that aren't found in most cinemas today.

"At the tail end of the war, the theater business was really strong," 79-year-old Bud says.

Unlike today's theaters, which have split their large facilities into multiplexes for viewing, the Garden Theatre had 1,150 seats, with rocking chairs in the balcony, and one panoramic screen. During those early years, moviegoers could pay a little extra to get a seat in the balcony so they could smoke. It might be hard now to imagine watching nearly four hours of film with clouds of cigarette smoke floating throughout the theater, but movie patrons, including youth who wanted to smoke without getting caught, didn't seem to mind, Bud Lima says.

"Back then, that was just how it was, and no one really gave it a second glance," Bud notes. "Nowadays, no one could get away with smoking in a theater."

Inside the theater lobby, plush floral carpet led patrons from the front doors to the candy-filled concession stand, creating an inviting entrance for moviegoers.

The concession area also had several artistic elements, including eight 3-foot-by-2-foot solid wood panels carved with different nature scenes portraying life in the Valley—showing swimming fish, deer, beaver and rabbits. Inside the theater, the two walls leading up toward the balcony seats had floor-to-ceiling murals painted by well-known Los Angeles artist and painter Tony Heinsbergen. The murals depicted the history of the Santa Clara Valley, from agriculture to industry. More murals were also painted on the theater walls on either side of the screen. These renditions depicted mythological themes, in the art deco style of the 1940s.

Bud was particularly fond of the brightly lit marquee that hung outside the movie house, because it was a visible landmark on Lincoln Avenue. He says the Garden Theatre was one of the first of its kind to have trapdoors to the left and right of the marquee so movie titles could be changed by employees who climbed up the stairs inside the building and out one of those doors onto the catwalk next to the marquee. This was a safe and easy way to get the job done as opposed to placing a tall ladder on the outside of the movie house from the street level and climbing up the ladder to change the letters.

Because movie titles were changed three times a week, this type of construction was considered innovative for its time, Bud says.

The Main Attraction

After the theater was completed, the Limas bought out their two other Garden Theatre partners and were ready to fire up the movie projector.

June 22, 1949, was a special day for Bud and A.J. Lima because it was the moment that art and film came together for the theater's official unveiling to the public. The theater played a double feature of Humphrey Bogart's film Knock on Any Door and the Walt Disney movie So Dear to My Heart.

Bud became the manager of the theater, and he says residents were immediately drawn to the movie house.

"Business was good back then," he says. "We paid off our main loans in three years."

Bud says the opening was broadcast live on radio station KEEN, as a newsworthy event. The Garden Theatre initially had three double features per week. And on some Saturday matinees, Bud says local parent-teacher association leaders would arrange a special "kiddie" matinee with parent chaperones. The theater also added promotions that included free dinnerware for the women who attended Mondays and Tuesdays and a cash night on Wednesdays, when hundreds of dollars were given away.

One of Bud's fondest recollections was the theater's first anniversary on June 22, 1950. Every person who came to the cinema that night received a piece of cake from nearby Willowette Bakery, and the women were given orchid corsages.

"The theater was a real neighborhood treasure for everyone," he recalls.

One resident who still treasures her time at the Garden Theatre is Judy Semas. She remembers seeing the Sound of Music with her "on-again off-again" high school sweetheart while he was home before his posting at Pearl Harbor with the Navy. During the movie, when Captain von Trapp proposed to Maria and asked if there was anyone he should speak to about seeking her hand in marriage, Semas's boyfriend turned to her and asked the same question.

"I think he'd planned the whole thing ahead of time, but it caught me by surprise," says 61-year-old Semas.

She remembers people shushing the couple during the proposal because they were trying to watch the movie. She recalls just being "blown away" by it all; she accepted his proposal. Although she became engaged that night, she broke the engagement after six months. Although she went on to marry another man, whenever she happens to see The Sound of Music, she remembers that day fondly.

She says when the theater was sold years later and was turned into a mall, it was like "ripping up a piece of my life."

"Still, I will always remember the lovely evening he and I spent at the old Garden Theatre," she says.

Like Semas, Willow Glen resident Leslie Marshall has cherished memories of attending the Garden Theatre in the late 1950s and early '60s.

"It was always a family outing for us," Marshall says, talking about her once-a-week trip to the cinema. "We really didn't go out otherwise, so it was a big deal. I always remember being enthralled by the beauty and majesty."

She said the Garden Theatre seemed very exotic because of the tile and the marquee. One of her favorite memories of attending the theater was drinking from the water fountain in the lobby. It was made of green tile, and she remembers it being octagon-shaped. She had to step onto a tile step to get to the fountain and says that even just drinking water seemed liked a special treat.

"Even the water fountain looked exotic," she says. "It looked Moroccan."

Although many young children during those years looked forward to the Disney films played at the theater, she says her parents only took her and her younger brother to see films they were interested in. She remembers being scared to death watching Psycho and Dial M for Murder.

Looking back, she says her parents felt bad in retrospect for bringing the children to the scarier films.

"We never went to any Disney movies," she says, laughing. "Now that I'm older, I won't watch those scary movies; they still get me."

Marshall wishes someone would restore the theater to its "past magnificence."

Almost everyone who spoke to the Willow Glen Resident had fond wishes of restoring the Garden Theatre to its former glory but recognized that doing so would be unrealistic now that the building has been reconfigured into a mini-mall.

San Jose Unified School District board member and Willow Glen resident Carol Myers says she was devastated when the movie house fell into disrepair and sat idly for years.

"I know small theaters like the Garden are expensive to maintain and a thing of the past, but if I ever win the lottery, I would buy the Garden and convert it back to its former glories," she says.

As a child, some 50 years ago, Myers looked forward to attending Saturday matinees. It was the highlight of her week, and she recalls the serial movies that would be continued to the next week, so she would always have to go to the next Saturday matinee.

Longtime Willow Glen resident Bonnie Lowry, 61, also remembers going to the Garden Theatre once a week when she was in junior high school.

"A lot of girls would go to make out with the boys," Lowry says. "I remember being very surprised at the time by that."

She remembers seeing Love is a Many Splendored Thing and going to movies with friends because going with her parents wasn't as "cool."

"We would have a dad drop us off and usually walk home after the movie," she says. "It was fun because you knew everybody there. In later years, I'd always hoped it might become a foreign-film type of theater."

Seventy-three year old Willow Glen resident Ralph Steiber says he remembers attending movies quite frequently at the Garden Theatre in the 1960s and '70s.

"I remember that the theater was quite ornate and lovely inside, a classic," he says. "It was sad to see it gradually deteriorate and finally close."

He says that if the building was still a theater today, he believes it would be a financial success. But Steiber also acknowledges that change is inevitable, saying, "One by one, we lose pieces of history as interests change with the times."

Longtime Willow Glen resident and Garden Theatre Barber Shop owner Bob Paez remembers seeing the Beatles movie Help! and even has an article written about the movie framed in his barbershop. He says he used to watch movies at the Garden Theatre at least every other weekend.

"I used to walk to the theater with my wife from Bird and Coe avenues," says 58-year-old Paez. "We would eat pizza at the parlor next door, then go see a movie. It was fun to meet everyone we knew at the Garden."

The Credits

After years of showing an eclectic mix of pictures, the theater was sold by A.J. in the mid-1960s for about $150,000, half the price it took to build it. By this time Bud had left his job managing the business, going back to school at San José State University to complete his engineering degree.

The Garden Theatre, like other small family-owned movie houses, fell victim to the popularity of television, as crowds began to dwindle. And larger multiplexes started popping up that took business away from the Garden Theatre and were less expensive to run.

In the mid-1970s, Al Rodriguez bought the theater and showed only Spanish-language films. His daughter Veronica Sidhu says he sold the theater in 1989. The theater stood idle for years until 1991, when it was gutted and reconfigured for commercial space. But after entrepreneurs Rick Alley and Greg Sterling were unable to pay their overdue construction loans on the project, remodeling work stopped. In 1994, it reopened with a new developer and owner, EPG Properties, and was converted into a mini-mall.

Today, the once-bustling movie house is home to a sushi restaurant, a barbershop, a nail salon, a party store, a shoe store and a post office. Office space is located on the second and third levels of the building. If it wasn't for the Garden Theatre marquee, younger generations might never even know that this eclectic mall was once a thriving movie house where the community gathered to share a laugh, a smile and a tear.