News & Views of Phillips Since 1976
Tuesday December 30th 2025
Avalon an oasis on Lake Street
The Avalon was built on the site of the 1909 Royal Theatre later named Seventh Ward Theatre, Rosebud Theatre and Reno Theatre. In 1924 was made over: Architect Ekman & Holm, renamed Avalon, and increased seating to 300. In 1937 it was enlarged again; Architect Perry E. Crosier to Streamline Moderne style using steel fabricated by Minneapolis Moline, 13 blocks away. It features a corner marquee tower with neon and incandescent colored lights restored twice since 1988.
The change to “Fine Arts” in 1955, starting with Welles”' “Othello” and to an art/foreign policy which soon gave away to sex pictures and porn. Then it was called the “Avalon Fine Arts” until Avalon name fell off marquee.
The theatre had an artesian well supplying a water fountain (on 2nd floor above the circular staircase and next to the “Crying Room”) and water sprayed into a metal chamber, stage right, to cool air blown through tunnels and ductwork as an early type of “air conditioning.”
In 1987 HOBT “re-purposed” this theater, renewed the intersection, and embellished the neighborhoods”' reputations just as it turns clay, water, paste, cardboard and talent into an ancient art form via participatory, community involvement and ownership.
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ReTHINK Your Drink ”” Every Sip Counts!
A partnership between the Backyard Initiative and the City of Minneapolis
The BYI youth”'s interest in reducing sugary drink consumption was ignited by the Teens Entering Existing Networking Systems (TEENS) Project”'s (BYI”'s youth-oriented Community Health Action Team”'s) participation in the City of Minneapolis”' ReThink Your Drink, Every Sip Counts! campaign. The goals of this participation were: (1) expanding the reach of the campaign; (2) strengthening the relationship between the BYI and the Minneapolis Health Department (MHD); (3) increasing the presence of the BYI in the Midtown Global Market (MGM); and (4) continuing to bolster MGM as a community-owned marketplace and gathering space that fosters community health. In support of these goals, five members of the TEENS Project completed a 2-hour training with a MHD staff member and subsequently facilitated 3 health promotion activities in the community. At the project”'s end, a member of the TEENS Project spoke to the Minneapolis City Council about the BYI”'s experience with the campaign.
This work led to a contract with MHD to conduct a small pilot project (March ”“ June, 2016) in the Midtown Global Market (MGM) to assess a model for working with small business-owners from diverse backgrounds to improve their facility”'s beverage environment.… Read the rest “ReTHINK Your Drink ”” Every Sip Counts!”
Keep citizen journalism alive!
Cartoon still fits, ex-CEO never did, as Children”'s seeks all Block 5 & Half a block between Columbus and Park Ave.
This Cartoon is reprinted from The Alley, July 2006. It was also a decade ago when Dr. Alan Goldberg, then CEO of Children”'s MN Hospitals and Clinics, addressed a City Council Committee hearing testimony from Phillips residents in support of saving the Trinity Presbyterian Church building (on the south end of “Block 5” down the alley from the Messiah Lutheran Church building), said, “Phillips is an unliveable neighborhood!” He neglected to admit that the threat to livability is untrustworthy institutions like Children”'s MN that continue to put Phillips Community under siege and a challenge to maintain constant vigilance and defend.
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