The first theater on the site of the current Downtown Independent opened in 1924 as the Arrow Theater.[3] The original owner, George Carpenter, had commissioned John E. Kunst to design a picture theater. The building included a pipe organ, two stores and auditorium seating for 500.[4]
Under a new manager, Frank Fouce, the theater began to focus on Latin American films in the late 1930s.[5] It was renamed on March 24, 1940 to the Azteca (later Aztec).[6]
The theater was renamed to the Linda Lea Theater in 1945.[6] During this period, it focused on Japanese films and was especially popular in the 1960s.[3]
By the early 1980s, the Linda Lea was declining, due to competition from nearby Japanese theaters and availability of Japanese programming on television and tapes. The theater closed and the building was bought by the Metropolitan News-Enterprise for use as an archive, but it fell into disuse and began to decay.[3]
Renovation and reopening (2005–2020)
Cinema Properties Group purchased the theatre in 2005,[3] and following extensive renovations which incorporated some walls from the original theatre, it opened as the ImaginAsian Center in 2007 and was rebranded as the Downtown Independent in 2008. It closed in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[6][7][8][3]
