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TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 25, 2025

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Egyptian Theatre

Celebrates 100 Year Anniversary in Style BY NATE SCHWARTZ Editor

Change in Coos Bay comes like the tides. It sweeps through taking things we’ve known, things we’ve sometimes taken for granted, and carries them away. Sometimes, never to be seen again. You’d be hard pressed to point out things in Downtown’s main strip that haven’t changed over the last century. The Tioga has stood tall for 99 years as a constant reminder of this to all who visit. Edging out that impressive feat is the Egyptian Theatre, which this past week celebrated its induction into a small centenarians’ club of theatres around the country. In 1922, The Motor Inn Garage and Service Station opened on Broadway but its life as an auto repair business would turn out to be short lived. Robert Marsden Jr. and his Coos Bay Amusement Company (CBAC) took up plans to convert the space into the area’s first premier movie house, hiring architect Lee Arden Thomas for the project. Investing $200,000 in the facelift, and $32,000 on a Wurlitzer Hope Jones Unit Pipe Organ (the equivalent of well over $4 million today), the CBAC opened the Egyptian Theatre in 1925 with a showing of the silent film Graustark starring Norma Talmadge and Eugene O’Brien. The accompanying sound was provided by Rex Stratton on the Mighty Wurlitzer. CBAC would run the theatre until 1949, selling it to Jones Enterprises out of California. Enter Stanley and Foster McSwain, who would manage the theatre until eventually taking over ownership in the 60’s. The McSwain family would be longtime stewards of the Egyptian even after it was sold to Regal Cinema’s in 1982. The theatre would change hands many times over the next 20 years until 2005, when Coming Attractions would close the doors of the Egyptian for the first time in 80 years. Recognizing the importance of this critical piece in South Coast history, the Coos Bay Urban

Renewal Agency (URA) would purchase the building in 2006 and hand the keys over to the newly formed Egyptian Theatre Preservation Association (ETPA) who has managed the restoration and operation of the theatre ever since. In 2010, the Egyptian was granted a place on the National Register of Historic Places and soon after received an engineering study to evaluate potential restoration opportunities. Due to seismic and structural issues revealed by the survey, the theatre once again had to be closed. From 2011 to 2014 the Egyptian was not only brought back up to code, but received huge upgrades thanks to over $1 million in donations from supporting citizens and organizations. A constant through all of this history is the Mighty Wurlitzer Organ, who thanks to over 40 years of stewardship efforts from Paul ‘The Wurlitzer Wizard’ Quarino, remains as the only functional original installation Wurlitzer in Oregon. The Wurlitzer was on full showing during the celebrations on November 15, with performances from the Egyptian’s resident organist Lee Littleﬁeld and visiting theatre organist Edward Torres,. Littleﬁeld has played the Egyptian’s organ for 50 years, having established the ‘Sounds of Christmas’ concert alongside Dr. Wilbur Jensen in 1974. Torres, 29, is a Southern California native who is the house organist for the Bob Baker Marionette

Theatre in Los Angeles, and tours the country to visit the few remaining theatre organs still in their original installations. “It’s an extremely rare treasure, not only the organ, but

the theatre itself,” said Torres. “These things are rarer than hen’s teeth. To ﬁnd, not only, a theatre that has lasted 100 years, but also with its original Wurlitzer is extremely rare. So

for me, it’s a great thrill to come back to roots of it all, to the early days of cinema-going.” See ANNIVERSARY Continued on Page 16

Merkley, Wyden, Colleagues Call on Trump Admin to Immediately Halt Plans to Upend Key Homelessness Program Ending Continuum of Care Program Could Force 200,000 People Back onto the Streets Washington, D.C. – Today, Oregon’s U.S. Senators Jeff Merkley and Ron Wyden joined their Democratic Senate colleagues to urge Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Scott Turner to immediately halt reported plans to make drastic changes to the Continuum of Care (CoC) program, which could result in nearly 200,000 Americans being forced out of their housing and back into homelessness. The 42 Senate Democrats called on Secretary Turner to instead use the authorities that Congress already gave him to expeditiously renew existing CoC grants for ﬁscal year 2025 to prevent massive disruption and frightening uncertainty for hundreds FIND US ONLINE: TheWorldLink.com

of thousands of vulnerable Americans in the coming months. “We write to express our deep concerns regarding the instability the entire homeless support system could face if funding delays, uncertainty, and rushed policy changes continue,” write the Senators. “HUD must immediately reconsider these harmful and potentially illegal changes that could result in nearly 200,000 older adults, chronically homeless Americans with disabilities, veterans, and families being forced back onto the streets. As Secretary, you have the authority to avoid this worst-case scenario by carrying out the See MERKLEY, WYDEN Continued on Page 10

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