1984

"In Concert at the Embassy" Record

The Emboyd Theatre, which was part of the Indiana Hotel building at Jefferson and Harrison Streets, opened on 28 May 1928. Designed by local architect A. M. Strauss and built by Fort Wayne builder Max Irmscher, the Emboyd featured a lighted marquee with a six-story vertical blade. It was believed to be the largest sign in Indiana at the time. When it opened, the Emboyd featured one of the largest pipe organs from the Page Organ Company. After struggling through and surviving the Great Depression, a new management group, Alliance Corporation, renamed the theater the Embassy in 1952. It was purchased in 1974 by the Embassy Foundation, a group of community leaders and volunteers who raised the funds necessary to save the theater from demolition. In the following year, the theater was entered into the National Register of Historic Places. Since then, both the building and its famous Page Organ have undergone a massive multimillion dollar restoration and emerged to become the site of concerts, plays, and other events.

The Embassy Theatre stands as a monument not only to the era of extravagant movie palaces, but to the dedicated group of people who were able to preserve a piece of Fort Wayne's entertainment history. This record album, "In Concert at the Embassy. Dick Clark," was recorded live at the Embassy Theatre's second benefit Concert for the Arts on 12 May 1984, by Sweetwater Sound, of Fort Wayne, Indiana. It features jazz music performed by instrumentalists Dick Clark (Greater Fort Wayne Chamber of Commerce president), Dennis Carroll, Dan Pallick, and George August and vocalist Eddie Butts.