The Strand Theater, designed in the style of an Italian palazzo, was built with 1,300 seats for stage, vaudeville, and motion picture productions. It opened on Oct. 18, 1915, for a theater troupe called the Strand Players, as well as a variety of traveling productions. It became the State Theater in 1929 and then the New World Playhouse in 1960. An early movie was Tess of the Storm Country starring Mary Pickford, which initially was made in 1914 and then remade in 1922. After the theater went out of business in 1981, the building was acquired in 1986 by the adjacent Guaranty Bank and incorporated into Guaranty Bank building complex.
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