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6 businesses at this address since 1921

The Beacham Theatre

46 N Orange Ave, Orlando, FL

A 1921 vaudeville and movie house built where the Orange County jail stood, later a string of nightclubs including the legendary Aahz.

📅 1921–present🏛️ Music VenueStill here
Open on the mapSlide back to 1921

The story

Braxton Beacham bought the old Orange County jail property in 1917 for roughly $17,500 to $20,000. The jail, in use since about 1873, was torn down in 1919, and several condemned prisoners had been hanged on the site. The Beacham Theatre opened December 9, 1921, with The Wonderful Thing starring Norma Talmadge and Buster Keaton's The Boat. It was on the Straw Hat Circuit and was included in major vaudeville circuits.

From 1976 the building went through a run of names, including Great Southern Music Hall, Laser World, Celebrity Dinner Theater, Aahz, Zuma Beach Club and Tabu. Aahz, from 1988 to 1992, was a late-night underground discotheque with a yellow brick road and a giant paper-mache Wizard of Oz head. The theater returned to the Beacham name in 2011. It was designated a local landmark on September 21, 1987.

What's There Now

It operates as a nightclub and concert venue in partnership with The Social next door.

Everything that was here

Did you know?

Performers on the vaudeville bill included John Philip Sousa, the Ziegfeld Follies, W.C. Fields and Theda Bara.
Local folklore says the building is haunted.
The final all-night Aahz-themed events ran from September 7, 1991 to July 4, 1992.

Nearby history

Sapphire Supper Club (now The Social)

54 N Orange Ave · 16 m away
Sapphire Supper Club opened April 1, 1994 in the building later known as The Social, next door to the Beacham.

Angebilt Hotel

37 N Orange Ave · 66 m away
An 11-story hotel that went bankrupt about two months after opening, survived a 1983 fire, and later served as a courtho

Old Orange County Courthouse (Orange County Regional History Center)

65 E Central Blvd · 151 m away
The 1927 courthouse where Ted Bundy was tried in 1980 is now a history museum, and the table in its courtroom has his na

Astor Theatre

37 W Pine St · 168 m away
Renamed after a 1953 sale to the B. S. Moss Theatre Corporation.

McCrory's (Woolworth-McCrory Building)

101 S Orange Ave · 205 m away
A 1942 Art Moderne five-and-dime that kept parts of an 1888 building and was torn down in 2003.

Rogers, Martyn & Company

37 S Magnolia Ave · 236 m away
Wholesale and retail grocery on the ground floor.

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Sourceshttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beacham_Theatre