RIVERDALE — The city lost a piece of its history Monday as crews started demolishing the Cinedome 70 theater to clear space for a new Larry H. Miller car dealership.
The Cinedome 70 theater was a landmark in Riverdale for the past 40 years. The first theater in Utah to show films using 70-millimeter film equipment, many moviegoers caught their first glimpses of Hollywood classics in the unique double dome-shaped building. "Star Wars," "Grease," "Jaws," "Back to the Future" and "E.T." are just a few of the big-name films shown on the two 70-foot-tall screens within the domes.
For many in Riverdale, like Allen Glines, Cinedome 70 was much more than just a theater.
"I've always told people it's hard for a building to be in one place for 40 years and not have any significance," Glines said. "Some people say that it's just a normal movie theater," but Glines said it served other purposes.
In its earlier years the Cinedome was the site of rallies for mayoral candidates, Miss Riverdale pageants and annual New Year's Eve parties. The theater was such an intricate part of the community, Glines explained, that it touched every person's life in one way or another.
"You have to think when it was standing, you could fit 1,500 people in it. And over the course of 30 years it's hard to imagine how many tens of thousands of people went through there," he said.
The theater's former glory faded in recent years as it fell into disrepair after being vacated in 2001.
A movement to save the theater gained a lot of support on the social media site Facebook. Glines led the effort with more than 7,000 people joining the group. Even after this morning, he doesn't feel it was a wasted effort.
"It was more to save the theater from being forgotten, because it was just going to be torn down and that was going to be that. It's understandable that people hadn't thought about it in several years because it hadn't been open and showing movies," Glines said.
He now wants his group, "Save The Cinedome 70," to be a forum for others to share their Cinedome memories and experiences.
Replacing the Cinedome will be a new Chrysler-Jeep-Dodge dealership. The Miller Group expects to complete the construction by June 2011.