by Rebecca Binno
This little movie house was once in the sleepy lakeside town of Keego Harbor. Today, the suburbs have sprawled out to Pontiac, and chain stores have sprawled out as well. That leads us to today, where the two final movies were shown at the Keego on August 15, 1998. The Greater West Bloomfield Historical Society sponsored a farewell event to recognize the significance of the theater. The Keego’s owner, Hani Mansour, said he would donate the theater’s sign, seats and other paraphernalia to the historical society.
The Keego, built in 1940, was originally a single-screen theater and was later divided into two theaters. The exterior was a porcelain enameled steel confection of zigzag art deco designs. The front facade had twin porthole windows on either side of a vertical “Keego” marquee sign. It once added a bit of stylized sophistication to a small town (pop. 2,932), and was a distinctive local landmark.
The demolition of the Keego Theater will be a loss of one of the last little neighborhood theaters in our metropolitan area. When will we realize that progress is not building a Rite Aid where our history used to be?
