Downtown Washington Court House has some fun buildings. Here’s one example that looks a little odd unless you use your imagination.

It’s the old Fayette Theater turned office building. The good news is that you don’t have to use your imagination. Here’s what it used to look like.

Walt Disney’s “A Swiss Family Robinson” was released in 1960 so this photo was taken that year or later. Notice it was billed as a color film.

The website Cinematreasures.org indicates the 750 seat theater opened in 1928. It changed hands in 1954, becoming the Fayette Cinema – the name it held until the day the theater was closed to become a disco in 1974.

Can you imagine the heartbreak the community must have felt losing this old theater in favor of a disco?

But time marches on. The disco is long gone and today it houses what appears to be a successful realtor’s office. I’m impressed they were able to maintain the integrity of the sign.

It’s fun to look around a neighborhood and imagine what buildings once were, to seek out the remnants of another time. Once in a while, we get lucky and stumble across evidence of what they really were.