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Lincoln Theater to reopen next month after several years of renovations
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BATON ROUGE — The Louisiana Black History Hall of Fame purchased the vacant Lincoln Theater in 2010, and efforts to reopen the historic venue have been underway ever since.
On Thursday evening, for the first time in decades, patrons were welcomed inside the Lincoln Theater for a soft opening.
"I'm excited about it, because you know I grew up here. This is a place I actually watched movies," U.S. Representative Cleo Fields said at the event.
Members of the Louisiana Black History Hall of Fame board said the milestone has been a long time coming.
"For us to get as far as we've gotten now, it's been a miracle, because not only did we preserve the theatre, we were able to add the additional building and to create the museum," said Peggy Bates, assistant director of the Louisiana Black History Hall of Fame Museum.
Bates said funding shortfalls were among several obstacles faced during the decade-long restoration process.
"Every time we would get a hold to a little funding, we were always glad to do it, but usually we were falling just a little bit short," Bates said.
Renovating a theater built in the 1940s also meant navigating outdated building materials and evolving municipal codes.
"The original sign was made using neon gas; well, it's been a while since they've done signs with neon gas," Bates said.
With backing from city-parish grants, state allocations and private donors, restoration work on the new Louisiana Black History Hall of Fame Museum at the Lincoln Theater is now complete.
"We had to start with the Lincoln; this is going to be the melting point for things to be built around it," Michael McClanahan, a member of the Lincoln Theater board of directors, said at the soft opening.
The theater's grand opening is scheduled for November. Its first production, "Mahalia: A Gospel Musical," is set to debut at the venue in December.
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