Orpheum Children's Science Museum
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The Orpheum Children's Science Museum is an old Orpheum theater in downtown Champaign that was turned into a children's science museum. The Museum covers all of the entrance to the theater, and some adjoining space outside. There are plans to turn the stage and theater part into exhibits soon. The Orpheum has many exhibits, ranging from a simple machines castle to a musical instrument made of pvc tubing.
The Orpheum also offers other activities, inculding field trips, summer camps, 'weekend wizards', and a girls do science club. Throughout the year many classes or clubs come to the Orpheum for hands on science teaching in many different fields. The summer camps, each a week long, vary in topic from dinosaurs, physics, inventing and robots. The girls do science club offers girls a chance to tour laboratories of women who work on the U of I campus, as well as other opportunities.
The Orpheum is supported mainly by volunteer effort. The makers of the exhibits are, for the most part, unpaid, as are the people running the summer camps.
[edit] The building
George L. Rapp, an 1899 alumnus of the University of Illinois School of Architecture and founder of the firm of Rapp and Rapp along with brother Cornelius were the architects of the New Orpheum Theater. They designed over 400 theaters including the Majestic Theater in Dubuque, Iowa (1910), the Chicago Theatre (1921), Bismark Hotel and Theatre (1926), Oriental Theater, Chicago (1926), and the Paramount Theatres in New York (1926) and Aurora (1931).
Rapp and Rapp designed the Orpheum as a scale model of the opera house at Versailles. The following year, they designed the Al Ringling Memorial Theatre, Baraboo, Wisconsin; also a model of the Versailles opera house. The Ringlings,however, spent considerably more money for decorations.
The Orpheum interior style is French renaissance and Baroque and the exterior is Classical Revival. There were 754 seats and 18 loge boxes.
General contractor was Wile Brothers of Chicago, specialists in theatre construction. The contract price was between $65,000 and $70,000. Work began in late May of 1914. Mandel Brothers of Chicago had the contract for the draperies and other interior decorations. The scenery was done by Sosman & Landis of Chicago, who were considered the best scenery painters in the middle west.
Opening Night was on October 19, 1914. The evening's performance began with the New Orpheum orchestra, under the leadership of Larry J. Powers, playing the "Illinois Loyalty", followed by "America" and "The Star-Spangled Banner". Mayor Oliver B. Dobbins gave a short speech complimenting the management for its elaborate and expensive effort to provide such an elegant theatre. Five high class vaudeville acts were presented, headlined by singer and comedian Herman Timberg, who had appeared a few weeks earlier at Chicago's Palace Theate. The evening close with moving pictures.
The owners were Joseph M. Finn and Marcus Heiman of F&H Amusement Company. The manager was C.S. Harris.
Some memorable performances at the Orpheum due to the fact it was a main vaudeville stop in Champaign and Urbana, and a member of the famed Orpheum Circuit, the Orpheum played host to many famous vaudevillians, including Trixie Friganza, Red Skeleton, Harry Houdini (1923), Chic Sale, Virginia Sale, Will Rogers (1915), the Marx Brothers (1918), Bill Robinson (1921), Jack Benny (1922), Bob Hope (1928), and Burns & Allen (1929). A few of the now classic films shown during the Orpheum's long history include "Birth of A Nation" (1916), "Intolerance" (1917), "City Lights" (1931), "Gone With The Wind" (1940 & 1968), "Dumbo" (1941), "A Streetcar Named Desire" (1952), "Mister Roberts" (1955), and "A Hard Days Night (1964).
The Champaign Preservation and Conservation Association (PACA) sponsored a public meeting on April 8, 1989, in response to plans to raze the theater. This meeting was held to gage public interest in saving the Orpheum Theatre. The City of Champaign purchased the Orpheum and adjacent building as a site for a possible parking deck in January, 1990. The city allowed 45 PACA volunteers to spend Saturday, July 7, 1990, removing the aluminum facade to reveal the original look of the building and to assess any damage.
PACA hired theatre consultant Michael Hardy to do a feasibility study of the Orpheum. He suggested, in July 1990, a children's museum as a possible use for the building. The city did not have a children's museum and there were already several successful performing arts facilities in the area.
The City of Champaign razed the adjacent warehouse building in February 1991. In the fall of 1991, the theatre facade was cleaned and painted and the marquee given cosmetic repairs by PACA. The trompe l'oeil cornice reminiscent of the original was painted above the theatre entrance.
The Discovery Place, Inc. held its first board meeting on February 5, 1992. The first Discovery Place fundraising/publicity event - A Kids Building Fair - was held on June 20, 1992, in the parking lot in front of the children's museum.
