Culver Theater Thoughts

by

I’ve been to four meetings in the past few weeks where the Culver Theater was discussed. This is about the Culver Theater on Lake Shore Drive, not the former ones on Main Street. It has been through many reiterations and multiple names, but its days as a movie theater ended more than a decade ago under the weight of increasingly expensive film rental fees in an aging venue. Before it closed, it had weathered the onslaught of VHS rentals (remember Bick’s Flicks at 820 Academy Road?), but lost the battle to streaming services such as Netflix.

Tom Ruane, a Culver Academies grad, bought the property with a sense of nostalgia and a passion to bring it back to life. I met with Tom several times regarding his passion project. During one of those meetings I climbed through the rafters with him and at another, I and the contractor he had working there stood on the marquee, verifying that it was structurally sound. (The then Building Commissioner/Inspector didn’t agree due to some loose soffit.)

CMA Cadets lining up at the El Rancho Matinee

Tom had made a false start at a Not-For-Profit (NFP) to pull the project together that initially failed. His second pass at a Theater NFP did better and was moving the project forward when Tom tragically passed away in January of 2020. Tom’s vision for the future of the theater was a bit scattered, but it was based in his memories of visiting the theater as a Culver Cadet. The Saturday matinees were very popular as one of the few places a cadet could take a date and sit in the dark, relatively unsupervised! The theater was generally full, regardless of what was playing. Several other Culver Academies grads had also expressed an interest in Tom’s vision, so there was some financial backing. Tom invited me to be on the NFP board, but I chose to pass on that opportunity. Kudos to those who stepped up.

Tom’s untimely passing set the group back as the property was tied up in probate for a period of time. It’s finally been released to the NFP’s control. With that piece in place, the Culver Redevelopment Commission has chosen to support them in an READI grant application. This is for the Arts & Culture portion of READI. Marshall County Community Foundation (MCCF) will also be supporting this effort. Since it is Lilly Foundation money, the MCCF endorsement will carry weight.

The NFP is concentrating on the theater. They have had it reviewed by Indiana Landmarks, who deemed it old, but not historic. While having mixed feelings about that, it has released them to dream bigger and look at building new in lieu of trying to renovate. Their current plan is to create a multi-media venue similar to what the Rees Theatre in Plymouth has become. To accomplish this, they are requesting +/- 20′ in additional property to be donated to the theater from the adjacent Town of Culver parcel to the west. This would give them a building width of 50′. It wasn’t stated, but I assume they are going to extend the building to the north as well. There is some depth to gain towards the alley. They are not planning to extend above the 35′ height restriction, though if they follow through with a rooftop patio, they would need to accommodate an elevator/stair shaft extending above the roof line.

The Osborn Hotel at the NW corner of Ohio & Jefferson Streets

The Town of Culver has bigger plans and their READI application included money for the theater, but also included money for planning renovations all along the portion of Lake Shore Drive (LSD) adjacent to the Town Park and including in the Park. This falls under the most recent Comprehensive Plan recommendations to create an entertainment district in this area. One thing I thought interesting about this was their concern of not increasing the heights along this stretch of Lake Shore Drive. They will be limiting development and, to be somewhat mercenary, assessed value… This strikes me as odd since we have current buildings such as the First Farmers Bank & Trust building and The Cove exceeding that height restriction, they are planning a new Institutional zoning district for the Culver Academies that explicitly waives that height restriction because of the number of buildings they build higher, and even historical buildings from the past such as the Osborn Hotel were above that level.

I appreciate the Culver theater NFP’s enthusiasm, but I do have some concerns. The Rees Theater in Plymouth is a beautiful and popular venue, bringing entertainment and visitors to Plymouth on a regular basis. That said, it continues to struggle financially. There is no doubt that it is a resource for the City of Plymouth, but it’s sustainability is a concern. They had hoped to achieve an endowment capable of bridging this gap, but so far, that effort has stalled. While it is currently a fairly new facility, there will be maintenance & renovation requirements in the future, that they will be unable to save for if they are not viable on a self-supporting basis. That means they will be going back to the well to find donors to save it again. Culver’s Theater will be a smaller venue in a smaller community. Sustainability will be a challenge in the smaller market. The question in my mind isn’t whether this is a laudable thing to do that Culver will benefit from, but more to the point of whether they can fund an endowment on top of the construction costs that keeps the dream alive.

The funding won’t be the only challenge. Culver does an above average job of communication on new programs and changes. That can be a double-edged sword, as it allows the NIMBYs to organize and be vocal. If I had to guess, I would say that bringing the theater back is a typical 80/20 issue in Culver with 80% support. Despite that there are already naysayers from the adjacent condos to the north concerned about losing their view, others bemoaning the already strained parking situation on summer weekend evenings and still others begrudging the Town giving up any of the adjacent lot for the venture to another NFP. You would hope the majority would prevail, but the other voices will be heard. Even among the supporters, there is some misconception regarding the Town’s lot to the west, assuming that it could be used for theater parking. To date, the Town has always kept this lot reserved for the fire department, so there’s no reason to expect that to change… or to change without the fire department pitching a fit…

A few thoughts on the parking:

  1. Lake Shore Drive (LSD) is kind of a mess. The Right-of-Way (ROW) meanders and has an inconsistent width. While the GIS is likely off in some areas, it would appear there are encroachments. At a recent Redevelopment Commission meeting, infrastructure issues were alluded to. If major changes are in the works for LSD, parking could be examined at the same time. The width would allow some narrowing, possibly changing some of the parallel parking to angle parking or with the width, maybe some of the angle parking could become 90 degree parking. In either case, additional spaces may be achievable. Any narrowing of the traffic lanes would increase pedestrian safety as well. (One of the previous plans suggested consideration of a small round-a-bout at the bend in LSD at the entrance to the park to enhance safety and traffic control.)
  2. While the Town is encouraging biking through the addition of the trails, very little is being done with biking infrastructure in the LSD or Main Street shopping areas. A few bike racks could encourage bike use, freeing up spaces.
  3. The Town sells 800+ golf cart permits each year. The funds from those permits could be used to create some golf cart spaces throughout the LSD area. There are creative ways to do this. One suggestion would be to turn some of the parallel parking into angle golf cart parking. This would be a two or three to one gain in parking spaces Just turning the end of aisle space in an angle parking or 90 degree parking space into two stacked golf cart spaces would be positive.
  4. I know this would be a tough sell with the fire department, but the existing lot configuration is inefficient. The lot could be reconfigured to have more spaces and still have designated fire fighter parking for emergencies. They could be allowed to block it off for events and truck maintenance while allowing the theater, restaurants and Park to gain spaces that currently sit vacant +90% of the time.

So, if you follow me here, you know I like to think outside the box. Here’s a more radical idea if the theater fails to gain traction on Lake Shore Drive. The Town wants the theater torn down, so the existing structure will be gone, one way or another. What if the theater group is unsuccessful there? Would they consider continuing the mission to provide an entertainment venue? Would they consider the preservation of another historic building? In the current Culver real estate market, the lot the theater sits on would sell for a stupid amount of money. The condo owners to the north would bid it up, just to keep it empty. Another developer would no doubt look at a multi story building with condos and maybe a bit of first floor retail. That could be seed money to do something else. What could that something else be?

Take a look at the Wesley United Methodist Church on School Street. As with many modern Methodist Churches, the congregation suffered a schism over a divergence is their beliefs. As with many of the Churches in Culver, Wesley United Methodist Church was already struggling with membership attrition, which was only exacerbated by the split. Is this a chance to save this Church before it lands on Indiana Landmarks Sacred Places list? Constructed in the 50’s, it is an iconic Culver fixture that should be preserved.

The building is in relatively good condition. Aside from the Sanctuary, which could continue its life as a public gathering space, it also includes a secondary entertainment area in the basement where there has been a stage as well. It has a large, working kitchen, an elevator to access both floors, and many ancillary classrooms and offices that could be repurposed. It sits on wide streets with ample parking and for larger events, it sits a block away from the school parking lots to the north and south. If the venue is successful, College Avenue is wide enough to convert some of the parking to angle parking for additional spaces and the Church owns a vacant lot to the north that could be converted to parking as well.

This takes it away from being in the “Entertainment District”, but in some ways, that’s not a bad thing. The location is easily accessible and does not carry the same parking issues that LSD has. The Church building would be preserved, The Church congregation would no longer have the crushing maintenance issues above and beyond those necessary for the congregation size and thus, would have funds available for growth and pursuit of their mission.

I realize this idea will be scoffed at and likely ridiculed, not in the least by the current Wesley United Methodist Church members, but it is mainly an exercise in looking at options and not being too tightly tied to just one solution. Being fixated on an original idea, can sometimes become debilitating, when there may be more than one solution.

I hope the theater is successful in some form and figures out the sustainability issue. The revival of the theater has been high on the list of surveys done for recent comprehensive plans, and the Stellar efforts. It is good that it is getting some attention, whether it comes to fruition or not.

Earth Day 2026

by

It was heartwarming to see the elementary kids out helping plant trees at the High School this morning. Kudos to Karen Shuman, School Superintendent, and Kevin Danti, Town Manager, for leading the effort with shovels in hand. Jud Dillon would be proud!

Image from Edge Family Farm Website

The property has a history with my family, as it was formerly part of my Great Grandpa Russell Easterday’s farm. When I was 7 or 8, I remember riding my bike to the end of Slate Street to give treats of carrots to the members of Grandpa Easterday’s herd of white-faced Hereford cattle that were brave enough to come see me at the fence. At one time, the Easterday farm extended all of the way down to Easterday Construction. Before the office building was built in the 50’s, there were cattle barns and the red barn on the property was known as the pony barn where grandpa kept horses. Russell and Wanda Easterday lived in the brick house on the west side of the north end of Ohio Street.

Arthur Judson “Jud” Dillon and Grandpa Easterday were friends. Like my grandfather, Jud was a farmer that moved on from farming to better support is family. In both cases they became teachers. Grandpa moved on to construction while Jud moved from teacher to guidance counselor to High School Principal. Jud’s farm surrounded the intersection of 10 & 17 at the entrance to Culver from the north. If you look up old deeds in that area, you’ll see that the town lots in that area are part of the Dillon Addition.

When the high school was built, there were few, if any, trees in the pasture. All of the older trees you see around the high school were planted by Jud. Since the high school was built in 1969, and the first Earth Day was in 1970, it’s hard to say if those trees were tied to Earth Day or not. As Jud’s son, Gary, relates it (Stories and Stones ’25, 17 min mark), Jud had an affinity for trees and was responsible for planting them all around Culver while Gary was responsible for watering them.

It’s nice to see the legacy continue. The school property definitely needs a few more trees!

Happy Earth Day!

Blast from the Past: The Culver Second Century Committee

by

This is mostly a historic reference piece from my memory. I can’t find much in the way of documentation. Forgive me if I misremember and as always, I’ll update it if better documentation comes along. Out of curiosity, I checked Judy’s history page and there wasn’t even a mention of the Second Century Committee, but I know her focus is on older things.

I served on the Culver Chamber of Commerce board of directors from 1990 to 2002, holding every office except chairman. John Thompson worked at the Culver Academies and served on the board and as board chair for several years in the mid 90’s. Jim Dicke II‘s purchase of properties around Culver had not gone unnoticed by the Chamber. He had purchased, demolished, and cleaned up multiple properties around town, but there hadn’t been any movement towards development. (To this day, there are several vacant properties that he still owns.)

Through his connections at Culver Academies, John arranged a meeting with Jim in New Bremen, Ohio. A delegation from the CCC went, including John Thompson, Erik Freeman, Pam Fisher and myself. Jim was a gracious host, giving us a tour of his company, Crown Equipment Corporation, their offices in downtown New Bremen and a general tour of the Town. Over a lunch at a New Bremen restaurant, Jim shared what he had done with New Bremen.

The Village of New Bremen is very much a Crown Equipment Corporation Company Town. Crown Equipment is the main employer in the area and it was in Crown’s best interest for New Bremen to thrive. But as a small town with only one large employer, this was difficult. This was made more challenging by their rural location without direct connections to any major highways. Jim made the decision to invest in the community. Houses were purchased and renovated as Bed & Breakfasts for use by Crown Equipment visiting guests and consultants. A downtown block was purchased, preserving the facades to maintain the local charm, but completely rebuilding everything in the back half to serve as corporate offices, bringing Crown employees and visitors into the downtown. An older car dealership in the downtown was purchased and moved to the edge of town, to allow for more appropriate use of the downtown streetscape. The restaurant we were meeting in was upgraded and kept viable through subsidies in order to be there when Crown Equipment needed a place to take guests.

James Dicke II Photo from https://horatioalger.org/

It was during this meeting that Jim made what I considered an iconic statement, which I have repeated for decades now: “Towns are either growing or dying. They can’t stay the same.” I don’t know if this was an original statement, but I’ve not seen it anywhere else. (There is a version of it from Lou Holtz about individuals that I found, but I’ve always attributed the town version to Jim.)

Jim said his vision of Culver was to see Culver Academies become more integrated into the community as Crown Equipment had done with New Bremen. He said he wanted to see the town of Culver thrive, as he thought it was important to the Culver Academies. You can see his fingerprints on this through the move of some Culver Academies administrative offices to the former Mr. T’s Drug Store at 820 Academy Road and to the former Culver Community School’s administration building at 222 North Ohio Street.

John asked the big question, “What would it take for you to invest in Culver like you’ve invested in New Bremen?” Jim responded that obviously he already had, through some of his property purchases and clean-up, but there wasn’t a clear path for Crown Equipment to have a Culver location. He did say he was happy to continue his efforts to involve Culver Academies in the Town of Culver and would support efforts to bring more industry to Culver. But he added the caveat: the town needs to show they are organized, have a plan and are ready for changes.

Our group was pensive on the return trip to Culver. While we felt we had made progress with the things the Chamber of Commerce was doing, Jim had pointed out some community shortfalls, the most obvious being a lack of collaboration. From this discussion, the Culver Second Century Committee was born. Culver Academies was going through their 1994 centennial celebration. The Town of Culver was previously named Marmont and changed its name to Culver in 1885 to honor Henry Harrison Culver, founder of the school. It seemed fitting that our new group reflect change as the Town of Culver entered its second century.

The Culver Second Century Committee (SCC) was created as an offshoot of the Culver Chamber of Commerce (CCC). This allowed SCC to exist under CCC’s 501c(3) status. This also gave the CCC some oversight and responsibility for the group, but allowed other groups to participate without direct CCC membership. There were no membership dues or other impediments to participation. We actively recruited participation from the town government and other civic groups such as the Lions, Kiwanis, Tri Kappa and others. The goal was to start a dialogue and create some synergy between the groups and to have some common projects in lieu of each group raising funds for similar efforts.

The group formed a steering committee consisting of four members. It intentionally recruited a mix of Chamber members and non-Chamber members for the steering committee to reinforce the collaborative goal. I did not serve on the initial steering committee, but did serve for a time after the initial member’s terms expired. The group began having quarterly lunch meetings which resulted in a true collaborative spirit. Town government representatives were involved as well, so we had a wide spectrum.

The first major thing tackled by the group was the Community Needs Assessment and Recommendations conducted by Mary Means & Associates, Inc. out of Alexandria, Virginia. (I believe the Town of Culver has copies of the original document, but I couldn’t find it online to provide a link. I do have a copy if anyone would like me to share it.) The Community Needs Assessment was completed in October of 1997. This was not a deep diving document, but it did gather public input and act as a catalyst for next steps. Even back then housing was an issue mentioned. There was also a recommendation for updates to the Comprehensive Plan and the Zoning Ordinance.

SCC continued to meet and push for changes. The next piece to come out of the Needs Assessment was the Culver Community Charrette lead by Ratio Architects. This resulted in the Culver Community Charrette Handbook presented in November of 1998. Ratio Architects built on and expanded the ideas in the Needs Assessment, defining some of the themes of Culver to expand upon. An example of this was the use of fieldstone throughout Culver, which lead to the Chamber sponsoring the new sign with fieldstone columns at the 10 & 17 entrance to town and the covering of the Lakeshore Drive wall across from the Root Beer Stand with fieldstone. Sand Hill Farm used this theme with the entrance sign on Sand Hill Boulevard. The Paddocks used this theme with the fieldstone facades on the townhomes in their development.

Welcome to Culver Sign at intersection of 10 & 17

After the charrette, Ratio Architects was hired to update the Culver Comprehensive Plan. That version of the plan incorporated many of the themes from the Needs Assessment and the Community Charrette. While this was a Culver Plan Commission project, the Second Century Committee remained involved. But unfortunately, as the ownership of the project transitioned to the town, some of the collaboration and commitment to SCC waned.

Over time, the SCC steering committee became less of a guiding group and started becoming more of an action group. I was no longer part on the steering committee, but still attended the meetings. Unfortunately, in this time frame, the meetings with the larger group ceased and the underlying groups had less stake in SCC. Culver Chamber was going through some transitions as well, so SCC was mostly on its own.

For a while the SCC steering committee was taking on different projects. For example, Dick Brantingham was on the steering committee for years and shepherded the sidewalk program, working to pair residents and/or businesses on the same block with the town’s replacement assistance program in order to maximize the impact. There were other projects like that as well.

In 2011, the SCC made another change in direction as it became part of Indiana Main Street and got rolled into the Visitors Center and/or one of the other organizations. To the best of my knowledge, the Second Century Committee didn’t make it through the first quarter of Culver’s new century and if there are remnants, it no longer functions as intended.

Connecting Dots…

by
110 North Main Street

A couple of weeks ago I posted about going to the initial Collaborate Culver meeting, where there was a discussion about missing businesses. I suggested the possibility of some incubator space for potential new businesses to try out Culver rather than going all in on a new store front. Geno Nannini made a stab at this years ago, by renovating the Masonic Lodge (Henry H. Culver Lodge No. 617 F. & A. M.) building at 110 North Main Street, subdividing the second floor lodge space into apartments and subdividing the first floor into individual offices/shops. A mix of small businesses, Churches and Not-for-Profits have occupied the spaces over time.

Last year I spoke to the owner of the former trailer park site at 515 West Jefferson Street in Culver about his idea of putting up small, temporary shop facilities. He indicated that he had spoke to town officials about making that happen, but he didn’t get much traction with them. I think at this time he’s in talks about a hotel on that site.

Bringing this full circle, Bremen has been talking about a project called Bremen Village Shops, which sounds very similar to what was suggested for the trailer park property. That project should be coming to fruition this summer. It is being done in conjunction with the Town of Bremen. They are working through logistics, since the property is currently owned by the Bremen Redevelopment Commission and there are legal issues with having them serve as a landlord.

If the Bremen Village Shops are successful, maybe the Town of Culver will warm to the idea and consider something similar for Culver, whether at 515 West Jefferson, or on another site. It’s an interesting concept and it seems like an creative way to get some new businesses to give Culver a chance. Meanwhile, if anyone is interested, I don’t think 100 North Main Street is completely full…

Who should organize Culver?

by

There was an interesting discussion at the Culver Redevelopment Commission (CRC) last Thursday about potentially hiring someone to coordinate the various volunteer efforts in town. At one point the Town Manager referenced my post: Culver needs an Infrastructure Czar, saying that he felt this was a similar situation where Culver has lots of volunteers, often with the same people on different committees, but there was no coordinated effort. Years ago, this was the reason the Culver Second Century Committee was created… to coordinate all of the volunteer efforts. This sounds similar, but with paid staff. Can’t believe I haven’t written the story of the Second Century Committee, so I’ll put that on my list of things to do here. (Done!) It was basically started as an off-shoot of the Culver Chamber of Commerce in order to coordinate the volunteer effort of the various Culver Not-For-Profits. It flourished and morphed, but eventually became defunct over time.

One board member spoke about the success of the Culver Stellar Committee and then Marshall County Stellar Committee (Marshall County Crossroads), but then expressed disappointment that the offshoots, the Culver Crossroads Committee and the One Marshall County Committee haven’t moved projects forward post Stellar. Her take-away was the need for paid staff to direct the volunteers and keep people on task. This is the route One Marshall County is pursuing, while Culver Crossroads basically hasn’t met since completing the new (2024) Culver Comprehensive Plan.

I think the discussion was good, but I think there was a point missed about why the Stellar committees succeeded and the follow-up committees are failing. In my opinion, despite labeling themselves as committees, both the town and county Stellar groups were actually task forces. A Task Force by definition is a temporary group created to deal with a specific issue, usually made up of people chosen for their knowledge or experience in the subject. This is a key difference, since with a task force, there are defined goals and a deadline or deadlines to meet those goals. With a deadline, there comes a sense of urgency. This is what the Culver and Marshall County Stellar groups were.

I liked a lot of the points made at the CRC, such as reducing the number of meetings and organizing the various groups to keep them focused on common tasks. (When I was on the chamber board, we talked about “The 10 people that do everything…”. They were generally involved in all the various organizations, often in leadership positions, until their time was stretched, their efforts were diluted and they eventually burnt out and disappeared.) But… A town employee doing this is expansion of bureaucracy and most of us know that this could easily become the camel’s nose under the tent. My experience is that bureaucracies tend to be more about self-preservation than accomplishing things. I look at the City of Plymouth that had an engineering consultant a couple of decades ago, which became a full-time engineer, which became a full-time engineer with an assistant engineer, which became a full-time engineer and assistant engineer, farming work out to an engineering consultant. All with little change to the City of Plymouth population. Metrics of what success looks like as well as deadlines for that success are critical in my opinion. Mission creep isn’t automatically bad, but needs to be controlled and subject to oversight and approval.

From a serial volunteer’s perspective, I know committees tend to talk things to death and committee members that volunteer to do something are easily side-tracked by work, family and general life obligations. If Stellar committee (task force) items weren’t completed, well and on time, the Stellar reward was off the table. There was a sense of urgency that a standing committee rarely, if ever, feels. It takes a special employee to maintain that urgency on a consistent basis.

It will be interesting to watch how this plays out. If the town does pursue this, I hope they find that special employee.