Personal view
Mention the name Lyric Theater and my mind goes back to my childhood and elementary school days.
My heart skips a beat ... “will the Elizabeth Street building ever be rebuilt?” If it is rebuilt will it be the same as in the late 1940s when my three sisters and I walked Saturday mornings to its warm interior to see a movie?
The theater recently was in the news as its owner is making some repairs in order for passers-by to be safe.
In my mind, I see its round ticket office, I see its windows, I see its brick structure and I see the days I was a child and so eagerly waited for Saturday mornings.
The morning was special also, along with the movie of either cowboys or comedies, as there would be a colorful and funny cartoon. These cartoons were like chocolate icing on ice cream — so good!
We girls, just a few years apart, would hold hands, skip a little down the concrete sidewalks on Elizabeth Street, and perhaps sing a little tune. Those were happy mornings, times gone, but not forgotten.
One could say memories are forever, not like the broken panes in the theater window which have to be repaired. But not the round ticket office that looks like it’s waiting for us to return to the movies.
Just to drive by the lonesome theater on its busy corner of Tebeau and Elizabeth street gives me a sense of longing. A tearful longing to see my three sisters and parents again.
To have the theater rebuilt or just renovated would be the best Christmas present.
My family has gone to heaven now, gone just as the double apartment at 907 Elizabeth Street we occupied so many years ago. Some of the homes in the neighborhood just a few blocks from town still stand on this street, most remembrances of a time back then.
My sisters and I were given a quarter apiece to see a movie at the Lyric and to buy a bag of popcorn and a drink. Yes, only a quarter!
Some mornings I recall there would be an emcee and a lady assistant on stage calling some children on stage to answer questions about characters from children’s books. There would be prizes for correct answers.
At only age 8 or 9, I was asked “What did Ol’ Mother Hubbard put in her cupboard?’’ I was scared to death and finally whispered the correct answer “some bones!’’ I was too timid and my voice too low so I wasn’t heard and didn’t receive a prize. I don’t recall how I was asked to go on stage.
My Elizabeth Street neighborhood was alive with families and many children. There were the Mullises, who lived in the other duplex apartment by us; the Stanfields, the Millers, the Joneses, the Conners, the Tuckers, the Reids, the Penlands, the Hodges, the Andersons, the Peacocks, Mrs. Welch, Laura Ferguson and Mrs. Green, among so many others, their names I can’t recall.
My mind is like a large scrapbook printed with all these memories of the Lyric along with those of Mary Street Park (now Pernell Roberts Memorial Park) where we children had so much fun about every afternoon after attending Isabella Street School. We played games, swung in the swings, dipped in the cool waters of the canal — even though we shouldn’t have — and played softball on the field that’s still there and skated about the sidewalks.
While we played deep into the evenings once school was out, our families would sit on their porches, just chatting or looking at the stars. There were no air conditioners TVs, cellphones, Ipads or computers. Our duplex apartment featured a large front porch, just right for sitting and chatting in comfortable chairs.
The Lyric Theater stands as a symbol of those days gone by. Its strong structure still stands like a sentry helping so many to recall its grand days. May the theater continue to stand and one day become a grand structure welcoming so many people like it did years before — its doors swinging wide open offering hours of laughter, excitement and family togetherness.
Nickie Carter is a former staff member of the old Waycross Journal-Herald and a periodic contributor to the current newspaper.
