Saving Globe’s movie theater was a Kip Culver move

Kip Culver, Globe’s Mainstreet Director for 19 years, preserved, protected and promoted our historic downtown district in Globe. His work included saving the old Globe Cafe from demlolition, adding an elevator to the Center for the Arts, adorning the old jail with historically accurate cornices, finding money to put a new roof on St. John’s Episcopal church and restoring the old train depot and freight office. He would be smiling down on the deal Bobby Hollis and the town of Globe created that will pass the torch of managing the Globe’s only movie theater to Russell Allen and Allen Theaters. 

Kip understood what it takes to layer solutions to intractable problems. He had worked with Bobby after fire destroyed the original theater and was instrumental in helping him purchase the lot from the City and provide the context for the loan document outlining how critical the theater was to the economic and social life of Globe’s downtown. 

Kip was also passionate about preserving the iconic parts of our history and was the one who rescued the marquee from the old theater, repainting it and talking Bobby into incorporating it into the new theater, which required some modern engineering and an extra $18,000.  

“He was amazing,” says Bobby. “I miss him so much.”

Kip knew how important the theater was to Globe’s downtown and the social fabric of our area. And how important the Hollis family has been to the community over its long tenure in offering up entertainment to all over the last 75 years.  

The fact that the city was able to put a financial package in place – using a 20-year-old, never-used loan program – shows what happens when long-term planning meets its destiny.