Biography
Mitchel Henry Mark and his brother Moe Mark founded the Vitascope Theater (a special attraction of his Edisonia Hall in the Ellicott Square Building), one of the first permanent, purpose-built movie theaters in the world. It opened Monday, October 19, 1896 (according to local papers), in Buffalo, New York. It operated nearly two years, the longest run for any such theater at that time: comparable early theaters were temporary and lasted only days or weeks.
Although his name is usually spelled "Mitchell", on his grave site it is spelled "Mitchel"
His obituary notes that he was the first American to have a distribution arrangement with Pathé Frères to import Pathé films to the United States. Indeed, nearly the entire Vitascope Theatre program of October 19, 1896, consisted of Lumiere films.
With his brother Moe Mark, Mitchel founded the Automatic Vaudeville Company in 1904 in New York City. Among their partners were Adolph Zukor (co-founder with Jesse Lasky of Paramount Pictures) and Marcus Loew (founder of Loew's Theatres). It was based in form on Edisonia Hall and the Vitascope Theatre in Buffalo.
The Mark brothers went on to build and operate dozens of important theaters in the United States after their auspicious start in Buffalo.
In 1914, Mark Brothers opened the Mark Strand Theatre at 47th Street and Broadway in Times Square, New York City. Costing one million dollars, this theater may have been first real movie palace, specifically built only to show motion pictures. It was designed by Thomas W. Lamb and served as a model for many film theaters that soon followed it. The New York Times favorably reviewed the opening of this theater, helping to establish its importance. To manage the theater, Mark personally hired Samuel "Roxy" Rothafel, who went on to become the best known motion picture showman in New York City.
On December 31, 1917, Mark received a determination from the New York State Supreme Court that he had the sole right to use the name "The Strand" for a movie theater.
The Mark Brothers owned and operated more than a dozen theaters in the United States and Canada called "Mark-Strand" or "Mark Strand"
By 1917, Mark's importance in motion picture exhibition was such that when Cecil B. DeMille complained in his autobiography that exhibitors were protesting the high price of Hollywood movie rentals, he cited Mitchell Mark along with Thomas Lincoln Tally as the worst offenders.
Mark is credited with installing the first church organ to be used for the movies, at Cleveland's Alhambra Theatre in 1907.
Mark died of an infection at his family's home at 527 Richmond Avenue at the corner of Breckenridge in Buffalo in 1918. His body was buried in Forest Lawn Cemetery, Buffalo.
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