Pickwick Theatre
movie theatre in Park Ridge, Illinois, United States
The Pickwick Theatre is an art deco movie palace located in Park Ridge, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago.
Designed by Roscoe Harold Zook, William F. McCaughey, and Alfonso Iannelli, the Pickwick opened in 1928 as a vaudeville stage and movie theatre. It is widely recognized for its marquee and 100-foot tower, which appeared in the opening credits of At the Movies. The main auditorium, built to resemble an Aztec or Mayan temple, originally seated up to 1,400 people. Seating capacity in the main auditorium was reduced by 200 seats in 1968 and an additional 400 seats in 2012 as the result of renovations. The 2012 renovation project, valued at $1.2 million, also included a new roof, mechanical improvements and exterior renovations including those to the original marquee.
The theater was named in 1928 by the mayor of Park Ridge, William H. Malone I, for the title character Samuel Pickwick in Charles Dickens' novel The Pickwick Papers.
The building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1975 and continues to host films as well as live stage shows. In 1990, theatre management expanded the Pickwick by adding three new screens behind the original auditorium. In 2017, owner Dino Vlahakis added a 39-seat theatre located on the second floor of the rear building, in place of the theatre's offices.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Pickwick Theatre” as movie theatre in Park Ridge, Illinois, United States. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the places & architecture register because the source frames it as movie theatre in Park Ridge, Illinois, United States. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The strongest evidence will usually combine a dated visual record with documents produced by the authority responsible for the place. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 7, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q4362570. Authority coordinates are 42.011, -87.829. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1928, 1968, 2012 and 1975.
A single description cannot reconcile every naming convention, rebuilding phase or administrative transfer associated with a place. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
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Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Pickwick Theatre”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Pickwick Theatre primary sources, Pickwick Theatre archive and Pickwick research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
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Questions for further research
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Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Pickwick Theatre” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.