RPI purchased Proctor's Theater recently. We all know that with RPI ownership, something will finally happen after more than 20 years of false starts. RPI wants to turn Proctor's into a high-class hotel. I don't have a problem with that - adaptive reuse is splendid - but I find it difficult to see a structure that was built as a Vaudeville house getting converted to a hotel. Does this mean the theater has to be torn down, or gutted? We have lost too many private public spaces already.

What is a private public space? They are buildings built with private capital for specific purposes like a bank, theater, or department store, designed on a grandiose scale and meant to "experience," or to "feel' a certain set of emotions. Examples are Frear's Cash Bazaar (Fulton and Third), a work of art on the outside, and originally on the inside this shopping "center" was designed around a beautiful atrium with glass dome and colored panes, and an extraordinary staircase. Fortunately, the current owners kept the atrium and you can view it without being harassed, but the sense of being able to purchase anything from anywhere is long gone.

Another private public building is the former Manufacturers National Bank (Grand and 4th), now called Franklin Plaza. The inside of this bank was meant to exude wealth, pride, and a feeling that your money was safe here. Today you can still experience the beauty of the interior because it has been converted into a great place for weddings and other events - a public place.

There are other examples: the old Masonic Temple, now Senior Citizen's Center, with a great Art Deco meeting hall and ballroom, or Kennedy Hall, now being rehabbed by John Hedley. And that brings us back to Proctor's. When Frederick F. Proctor designed this five-story entertainment complex in 1913-14, he wanted us to experience the outside and interior detail, and not just the performances of this original Vaudeville house. This complex with theater and commercial space takes up most of the east side of Fourth Street between State and Broadway, and the facade of marble and terra cotta with lion heads and gargoyles is impressive today as it was on opening day.

Proctor's was billed as "Troy's Largest Amusement Place." Most of us "Little Italy" Catholics will remember the day at the theater when Jimmy Durante dedicated the opening of the new St. Anthony's School in the early '50s. Its voluminous space (seated over 2000 people) was designed as an entertainment space. To use it for living quarters would mean major changes.

You see this building has a very special place in my psyche and for many other Trojans. It isn't a former bank, or department store. It is a space that many of us used to escape our worries for a while. It's a place where we took our first love, our best friend, or to experience the thrill of a new movie, be it a love story, drama, sci-fi, or even a silly film about the Beatles. We even waited for hours in lines around the block. It was a place where others sang their first song, or performed their first act on stage. It was a place where you cried, laughed, or were scared silly. It was a place that carried as many emotions as there are seats.

Let RPI have the present city hall. They can tear it down and build a Hilton on the Hudson. Turn Proctor's into an entertainment complex, complete with restored theater, and new City Hall in the commercial space.

If that is not viable, be creative, but I will make my plea for the theater to the president of RPI: "Mrs. Jackson. Don't tear down these walls."

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