The Rudolph Wurlitzer Co.
1927

Updated by Eric Schmiedeberg, naming this as the source of information: Numerous citations over the decades in CONSOLE and MARQUEE magazine.

This instrument must have made a good statement in this theatre. Though the chambers and their swell openings were (and are) hidden behind an elaborate decorative grille above the proscenium, there were (and are) mostly hard surfaces in the auditorium. In a larger room, this instrument might have been somewhat \"strangled\" acoustically as the grilles have rather small openings to allow the sound out. Luckily, the auditorium is not terribly large. The entire Tower Theatre building occupies a small lot measuring just 50\' by 150\', according to the Broadway Theatre Group website.

I visited the Tower in 1987, before it closed as a movie theatre. I came to learn what the term \"shooting gallery-style theatre\" really meant at this time. The auditorium is fairly narrow and rather long. However, at the time, I thought ten ranks of Wurlitzer (with English Post Horn) would have done quite well in that space. I never got into the organ chambers, but the photos in the websites cited below seem to show that the 216 would have been a \"tight\" installation given the amount of cubic space that would have been taken up by the organ relative to the spaces provided for it. No doubt, the organ was very THERE.

For a real \"cook\'s tour\" of the WHOLE place, check out: https://losangelestheatresblogspot.com/2017/09/tower-theatre.html

For more interesting information: https://historictheatrephotos.com/theatre/tower-losangeles.aspx This web address features a (mislabelled as \"house-left\") photo of the house-right organ chamber.

To see many of the constituent parts of a Wurlitzer Style 216 in an excellent installation by Edward Millington Stout III: www.shomler/calsj/lobbyorgan.htm

Everything I have been able to find out over the decades about this Wurlitzer is that it was a standard Style 216 model and that it was moved by Wurlitzer to the Los Angeles Theatre in 1930 by the Tower Theatre\'s owner and operator. Also, this would have been one example of the 216 that was sold to someone other than the Fox-West Coast chain--for which it was created. However, an interesting fact conveyed by Broadway Theatre Group on their website is that Tower owner/operator H.L. Gumbiner was given the Los Angeles Theatre property down the street from the Tower from none other than William Fox. This being for the purposes of developing the property as Fox was embroiled in lawsuits at the time and was unable to do so himself. The Fox/Gumbiner/Wurlitzer 216 connection makes sense in this light.

It is believed that this instrument still survives. It mysteriously disappeared from its installation at the Los Angeles Theatre sometime in the mid-1960\'s, but no one I have spoken to or heard from believes that the organ has ever been parted out.

Information from The Wurlitzer Pipe Organ – An Illustrated History by David L. Junchen (comp. & ed. Jeff Weiler). The American Theatre Organ Society, 2005.

Wurlitzer Style 216

Factory date: April 23, 1927

Moved in 1930 to Los Angeles Theatre, Los Angeles, California