The Rialto Theater, 1946
https://www.digitalcommonwealth.org/search/commonwealth:qv33tw16k
This photo shows the Rialto Theater with a gorgeous Art-Deco front! By the time I went to the Rialto in the early 1960s, the theater had changed over to a sleeker (but less engaging) design.
The theater opened sometime in the 1920s under the ownership of Gorman's Amusement Properties. It had a huge Wurlitzer Theater Organ for silent films; the organ was still there when the Rialto finally closed down in the seventies. The site is now home to the Greater Roslindale Medical And Dental Center.
Note the small grocery store next to the theater entrance in the space now occupied by the Rialto Barber Shop; I'd bet dollars to dimes that "Henry's Fruitland" was the original location of the "Henry's" variety store on Walter Street near Fallon Field.
- Tim Casey, Webmaster