Projection Room, Rice Auditorium, Spring Grove Hospital Center

This photograph, taken in December 2000, shows one of the two original (c. 1936) carbon arc movie projectors in the Rice Auditorium at Spring Grove Hospital Center.  Although no longer in use, both projectors are still situated in their original positions in the Rice Auditorium's projection room.  In the days before TV's and DVD Players, patients and staff came to see the movies that were shown several times a week in the Auditorium.  Both projectors are equipped  for sound, and, contrary to the belief of some the  movies that were originally shown in the Rice Auditorium were "talkies."  The Wurlitzer theatre organ that now graces the stage is a fairly recent addition. Silent movies were already a thing of the past when "The Rice" was built.