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This building was constructed to house the First National Bank of Hillsboro, which opened here in 1888 with John W. Shute as its president. The original Italianate style façade was one of the most elaborate in Hillsboro. It boasted tall windows, cast iron ornamentation simulating columns and a bracketed cornice at the roof line with central parapet on which the word “BANK” was inscribed. Arthur C. Shute bought out his father's interest in the bank in 1911 and, in that same year, moved the operation (by that time, renamed the American National Bank) into its new building across the street.
When the bank relocated, this building was sold to Orange Phelps who used the space to open the Liberty Theater. In 1925, the theater was remodeled and renamed the Venetian. The parapet on the front elevation currently sports red tile roofs, ornate terra cotta urns and an architectural scroll detail which graces its west end. These decorative elements and the interior architectural details in the lobby are in the Mediterranean Revival style — which was evocative of Italian (Venetian) Renaissance design — and it is probable that they date to this 1925 remodel. Then, in 1957, a fire necessitated another remodel after which the theater reopened under what would become a longtime moniker: the Town (as it appears in the above photo).
A successful theater operator, Phelps also opened the Arcade in 1908, the Majestic in 1916, the Hill Theatre in 1937 and the Car-Vue in 1952 (the latter two in partnership with Harry Hill).
Finally, following a lengthy period of closure and steady deterioration, this venerable landmark underwent a long-awaited and much-celebrated renovation and debuted once again in 2008 under its former name: the Venetian Theatre.
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