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The Campus Theatre - A History by Denise Cummings (University of Florida)

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With the bold front-page headline, "Campus Theatre Opens Friday Night," The Lewisburg Journal celebrated the approaching opening night, January 17, 1941, with nearly four entire pages of coverage for the grand new motion picture theatre. Lewisburg Borough could now boast of Central Pennsylvania's finest movie playhouse residing right in its own commercial district, Market Street. Situated within an assortment of architectures inspired by the achievements of the past, The Campus, by contrast, offered 1940s Lewisburg "The Most Modern Showplace In Pennsylvania." (The Lewisburg Journal, 16 Jan. 1941). The Campus was designed by Philadelphia architect David Supowitz, whose characteristic Revival Art Deco architectural style also marked other theatres and building façades in Pennsylvania.

From its first screening on, The Campus promised to set a new standard for excellence in programming, featuring only Hollywood's Class "A" productions. On opening day, people came to see the musical comedy Love Thy Neighbor, a Paramount Pictures vehicle starring Jack Benny and Fred Allen. Most people came just to see the magnificence of the building, with its modern lines and interior and exterior decorative theme featuring orange and blue, the colors of Bucknell University. Lewisburg resident Betty Cook, then a captivated young girl, recalls the gala opening: "The fire trucks were there with lighting" beaming spotlights into the evening sky. "It was like a Hollywood premiere."

Over the years, The Campus Theatre has survived with astonishingly few changes. The Journal's feature article in 1941 emphasized the new Campus's functional and formal innovations, and its more than sixty-year old description fits nearly all of the interior and exterior décor and fixtures that remain intact today.

The newspaper detailed the theatre's functional properties, including its completely fireproof structure, air conditioning and heating systems, chrome turnstile for "ticketless" ease of entry, and seats containing springs that automatically raise when not occupied.
In keeping with the era's strategy of marketing the new decorative approach to movie theatre design, The Journal specified The Campus's form as well as its function. The theatre's curvaceous orange glazed terra cotta exterior façade anchors a prominent marquee featuring giant chrome and green neon letters spelling out "CAMPUS" and facing east and west on Market Street. The blue bison relief on the exterior front wall and the stainless steal blue and silver images of athletes embedded into each of the interior lobby doors characteristically respond to the local Bucknell University spirit.