Blue Hen Theatre replaces Casino after fire
After the Casino Theatre burned in 1912, Charles S. Horn built a new theater called the Blue Hen on the same spot.
These photographs from the Rehoboth Beach Historical Society and Museum’s collection show the Blue Hen. The movies featured include Charlie Chaplin’s “Triple Trouble” and another film starring Carlyle Blackwell and Evelyn Greeley, who worked together more than a dozen times during their careers. The second image shows the interior of the theater sometime between 1920 and 1925, according to the Rehoboth Beach Historical Society and Museum.
Horn continued to own the Blue Hen, as well as the Auditorium in Lewes, until 1956, when the movie industry hit a rough spot. According to a Dec. 29, 1956 article in the Evening Journal, Horn closed both theaters simultaneously due to increasing costs of operation and declining attendance. The growing popularity of television was also listed as a contributing factor.
The Blue Hen was purchased by William B. Derrickson, who already operated the Avenue Theatre and Centre Theatre in Rehoboth Beach, and the Midway Drive-In on today’s Route 1 behind Movies at Midway.
The Blue Hen was destroyed by a fire in January 1966. It was rebuilt by Derrickson and reopened as Beachwood Theatre by the summer of 1966.
