Americus' Amazing Architecture

Another treasure that for many years lay dormant is the Rylander Theater. For decades after it closed in 1951, it sat hidden behind a row of offices. Just a few old timers remembered its existence. Heather Stanley, the theater's Managing Director, told me many local people never knew it was there until it reopened in 1999.

Walter Rylander, Sr., the owner of the local Ford dealership, who saw silent movies in 1919 when he visited New York City, built the Rylander. The beautiful art déco theater opened in 1921 with a stage and dressing rooms for live shows and a screen for showing silent films. Its opening act was the touring company of the Broadway play, Lightnin'. In its heyday, it featured the Ziegfeld Follies, World War I sharpshooter Sgt. Alvin York, and Charlie Chaplin films.

It closed when the company running it opened a new movie theater elsewhere in town and until the fall of 1999, only Fred the Friendly Ghost and perhaps the restless spirits of former actors were the only ones occupying the theater.

Today the Rylander has been completely restored to its former glory. Much of the new has been added, but whenever possible, the original craftsmanship was restored. The stencils and plaster ornamentation is reminiscent of a more elegant age. It also is home to one of only three theater pipe organs in Georgia theaters, a 1928 restored Moller theater pipe organ known as "Little Mo." It features live performances. Of course, Fred is still there.

Heather told us of an incident when Fred made his presence felt. An actress had gone upstairs and was returning down the stairs alone when she stumbled and almost fell. She felt a strong hand on her back, preventing the fall. Fred proved his usefulness. Heather said they have often felt his presence, always in a good way. She commented that Fred is never felt on Mondays. Perhaps he was a theater employee in his human life and was off on Mondays.

I got to watch a performance of The Nutcracker and loved both the old-fashioned beauty of the theater and its modern conveniences, such as great lighting and sound and the beautiful backdrops behind the talented young dancers.

Just down the street from the Rylander Theater and across from the Windsor Hotel, the Empire Bank building, completed in 1911, is a Neoclassical Revival treasure. It has four columns and gargoyles at the on the sides. Each gargoyle is different. My favorite is the one that is sticking out its tongue like so many young social media persons.

The Americus Presbyterian Church, located at 125 South Jackson Street, was built in 1884, is a Victorian-Gothic building and the oldest existent church in Americus. The staff kindly let us in to view the interior. Our guide told us, "We were founded in 1842, but our first sanctuary burned down. This was built in 1884. If you look up, it is meant to look like the bottom of a ship." 

Looking up, it really seemed like you were looking down into the hull of a ship. The ceiling is narrow planks, and the support beams seem to curve like a ship's hull. The wood used is all Georgia pine. One special wood is called Curly Pine. It is a genetic deviation that you can only get by chance.  

Some of the windows relate to watery Biblical themes like Noah's ark or Jonah and the whale. One window is different; it was given in memory of Louisa Wheatley, the builder's wife. She helped him a great deal and died a year after the church was finished. The sun comes through and shines on the pew where she sat. Another window is a Tiffany. The rest are Queen Anne style glass. 

The bell is the original bell and the oldest bell in Americus. The fire department used to use it because they couldn't afford their own bell. So, when there was a fire, they would ring it. 

One building I found unusually striking and beautiful was the 1892 Romanesque Style Thornton Wheatley Building on the corner of Forsyth and Jackson Streets. Locally, it's known as the Pythian Castle because the third floor was home to a secret fraternal group called the Knights of Pythias.

The building was built by Isreal Thornton Wheatley, a Pennsylvania transplant who fought with the Sumpter Light Guards in the Civil War. It is a three story round-cornered building of red brick with a lot of decorative touches. Georgia marble was used for the marble trimmings. There is a round Art Noveau-stained glass window on the second floor directly over the entrance, with is at the curved point of the building. Other windows have a section of stained glass in their top sections. The name Thornton Wheatly is embedded in marble between the second and third floors.

It is a work of art as well as an architectural masterpiece. I doubt any builder today could build a competing structure.

In the early 1900s, every town wanted to have its own opera house. Glover Opera House opened on January 27, 1882 in the historic district at 111 Forsyth Street. It seated about 1,000 people and had a six-tiered balcony and a stage 27 feet deep from footlights to the back wall.

At first, it hosted mostly live performances, especially vaudeville shows. It later became Americus' first movie theater. Some of the celebrities seen here ranged from famed French actress Sarah Bernhart to heavyweight boxing champion, John L Sullivan, who boxed in a match here.

Before computers, libraries were a town's primary source of reading and research. T. F. Lockwood's firm designed the Americus Carnegie Library, which was begun in 1908 and completed in 1909. The town received a $20,000 grant from Carnegie to build the two-story building with an auditorium on the second floor. The building is one of its kind in Georgia. It's a Neo-Classical style with large composite columns and a prominent architrave atop the columns.

The first floor is used for commercial businesses today and the auditorium is home to The Canterbury Kitchen, an event caterer.

Built in 1883, the Renaissance Revival type Sheffield Hardware Company called itself "South Georgia's Most Complete Hardware Store." Today, it is The Maze, an antique and gift store mall with everything from antiques to clothing. I went down into the basement and noted what looked like the original brick floors. It won the best window decoration for Christmas this year.

Even the visitors' center is housed in a historic building. The Italian Renaissance building was completed in 1910 and had gone through changes in name and uses. Originally, it was a two-story building used for the post office and federal agencies. Congressman Charles Crisp had a third floor and elevator added in 1933. When the city got a new post office in 1969, the city acquired it and renamed it the Municipal Building. 

There are so many other historic buildings, and that's not even mentioning the dozens of beautiful historic homes here. You really need to visit Americus and see for yourself.