It’s Showtime, Again!
Wealthy Theatre Renovation Just a Part of Grand Rapids’ Revival
Excerpted from A Civic Gift
published by Michigan Land Use Institute
October 2003
The 1100 block of Wealthy Street was so poor at the end of the 20th century that young kids pushed drugs on the street for money. Today they attend art class on the same corner.
“Sometimes I come down through here and just smile,” said Thelma Rhodes, whose family owns and operates Rhodes Rib Crib at 1133 Wealthy Street. “It used to be chaos.”
The Rib Crib has drawn customers to downtown Grand Rapids for more than 30 years. Try the pork bar-b-que with thick sauce and a side of black-eyed peas to understand why. But the Wealthy Theatre directly across the street served as the gravitational center for this neighborhood business district for many more decades. In the 1920s people came by foot and car to see Charlie Chaplin’s silent films; in the 1960s they were still coming, enjoying Frederico Fellini’s latest release, buying fresh-cut flowers from the florist, and shopping women’s fashion boutiques.
Then, in the late 1970s, the theatre closed. Racial tension, substance abuse, and public disinvestment drove out most nearby business owners, their customers, and even longtime residents. Suddenly, windows were barred and buildings boarded up. In the really bad times, some of those buildings caught fire. And the city of Grand Rapids essentially forgot about the once-prosperous community at Wealthy and Diamond.
Neighbors Save Their Theater
City officials in 1989 slated the Wealthy Theatre for demolition. The neighborhood’s residents responded immediately with a visionary plan to restore the movie house and a sense of pride in their community.
“That theatre is our centerpiece,” Ms. Rhodes said. “I wanted to show the kids we stand for something. There’s always good and bad. It depends on the choices we make.”
Choosing to refurbish, not demolish, the Wealthy Theatre, built in 1911, was not easy. Against the backdrop of an inner city competing with shiny new suburbs for jobs and residents, the building had stood vacant for some 20 years. Its mosaic-tiled floor fell into the basement; water gushed down its interior walls during heavy rainstorms.
The Wealthy historic district is one of five contiguous, historically preserved
neighborhoods that play a major role in the city of Grand Rapids’ ongoing
revitalization.
The project required an orchestrated campaign of government incentives, private investment, and citizen action. It ultimately triggered a full-scale economic and cultural revival.
Wealthy Theatre reopened in 1998 as a community arts center. Inside, children paint pictures, watch films, and learn to dance. Outside, pedestrian traffic and civic energy is increasing. New ventures like Lady Love Barber Shop cut hair and make a profit. Established businesses have improved facades. Window signs in the few buildings that remain boarded up set a dramatically different tone for the future: “Developing Soon,” “Opening October,” “Wealthy Street Alive!”
…“Restoring the theatre was the pivotal turning point for this neighborhood,” says Carol Moore, a resident, landlord, and community activist in the Wealthy Theatre District. “We talked about it for years. And some people thought we were crazy. But once it opened, once people started coming back, the doubters became believers.”