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1928–1929
The house that brought sound to this county is the Colfax in South Bend, and the flag is documented. The Colfax Theater, 213 West Colfax Avenue, opened on August 4, 1928 (August 5 in the History Museum's count — printed as the conflict it is), the first theater in St. Joseph County to show sound pictures, and hailed by both South Bend papers as the first theater in the world to offer an all-sound program — Vitaphone and Movietone features from start to finish, with a Wurlitzer organ accompanying the newsreels and novelties. It was built for sound from the ground up, at $500,000, one of the first such houses in the country. The followers are dated: Mishawaka's Tivoli was wired for sound in 1929 with DeForest equipment and converted to full-time talkies; South Bend's Palace showed its first sound film in 1929 and played its last vaudeville in March 1930. No house on this ground took part in the transition, for the reason this section keeps printing: there was no house on this ground. Granger heard its first talkie in South Bend or Mishawaka, and the first screen it could have heard one on is named above.
From the Colfax Theater National Register nomination and Cinema Treasures (opening, August 4, 1928; first sound pictures in the county; the all-sound program); The History Museum, South Bend (the August 5 date); the Tivoli nomination (DeForest wiring, 1929); Building South Bend (the Palace's first sound film, 1929).