The Semaphore Library is a

public library A public library is a library, most often a lending library, that is accessible by the general public and is usually funded from public sources, such as taxes. It is operated by librarians and library paraprofessionals, who are also Civil servic ...

Semaphore Semaphore (; ) is the use of an apparatus to create a visual signal transmitted over distance. A semaphore can be performed with devices including: fire, lights, flags, sunlight, and moving arms. Semaphores can be used for telegraphy when arra ...

, South Australia. It was formerly the Semaphore Institute, Semaphore Town Hall, Ozone Theatre, and Semaphore Cinema, and is

heritage-listed This list is of heritage registers, inventories of cultural properties, natural and human-made, tangible and intangible, movable and immovable, that are deemed to be of sufficient heritage value to be separately identified and recorded. In ma ...

on both the state and national registers.

Institute and town hall

The building was constructed as the Semaphore Institute, an early

mechanics institute Mechanics' institutes, also known as mechanics' institutions, sometimes simply known as institutes, and also called schools of arts (especially in the Australian colonies), were educational establishments originally formed to provide adult ed ...

, and opened on 15 March 1884. It was designed by architects Wright and Reed, and built by Williams & Cleave. It was a stone building with an iron roof, with a main hall and stage, entrance room, library and reading room on the ground floor, and offices for the local municipality, the

Corporate Town of Semaphore The corporate town of Semaphore was a Local government areas of South Australia, local government area in South Australia. It was created on 20 December 1883, and re-gazetted on 17 January 1884, from areas which had been part of the District Coun ...

, and a gallery on the second floor. In 1889, it was sold to the municipality to be used as the Semaphore Town Hall. The municipality merged with the adjacent Corporate Town of Port Adelaide in 1900, but it continued to be rented out for community events by the Port Adelaide council. From 1910 until around 1912 or 1913, the hall was used as a temporary cinema by a number of organisers while continuing to be used for other community functions. These included the Greater Wondergraph Company, whose screenings were referred to as the Semaphore Wondergraph;

Ozone Theatres Ltd Ozone Theatres Ltd, formerly Ozone Picture Company and then Ozone Amusements Ltd, was a cinema chain based in Adelaide, South Australia, from 1911 until 1951, when it sold its theatres to Hoyts. It was founded by Hugh Waterman and friends, and ...

; and the People's Concert and Picture Company. During the

First World War World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

, the All-British League held meetings and recruitment drives at the town hall.

Cinema

In 1929, the town hall underwent extensive renovations to designs in

Art Deco Art Deco, short for the French (), is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design that first Art Deco in Paris, appeared in Paris in the 1910s just before World War I and flourished in the United States and Europe during the 1920 ...

style by architect Christopher Arthur Smith and converted into a

cinema Cinema may refer to: Film * Film or movie, a series of still images that create the illusion of moving image ** Film industry, the technological and commercial institutions of filmmaking ** Filmmaking, the process of making a film * Movie theate ...

, opening as the Ozone Theatre on 9 December. It included orchestra and balcony-level seating. It includes a

proscenium A proscenium (, ) is the virtual vertical plane of space in a theatre, usually surrounded on the top and sides by a physical proscenium arch (whether or not truly "arched") and on the bottom by the stage floor itself, which serves as the frame ...

in width and a stage in depth, and was equipped with a

RCA RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded in 1919 as the Radio Corporation of America. It was initially a patent pool, patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse Electric Corporation, Westinghou ...

sound system. Smith was a prominent architect of the period, designing many theatres and cinemas, and a number of public buildings including a refurbishment of the Brighton Town Hall. The company later became

Ozone Theatres Ozone Theatres Ltd, formerly Ozone Picture Company and then Ozone Amusements Ltd, was a movie theater, cinema chain based in Adelaide, South Australia, from 1911 until 1951, when it sold its theatres to Hoyts. It was founded by Hugh Waterman and ...

, and would become one of the two major movie chains in South Australia. In 1951,

Hoyts The HOYTS Group of companies in Australia and New Zealand includes HOYTS Cinemas, a cinema chain, and Val Morgan, which sells advertising on cinema screens and digital billboards. The company was established by dentist Arthur Russell in Melbo ...

bought out the Ozone company, and in 1952 undertook a complete refurbishment of the Semaphore Cinema, reopening on 20 November as Hoyts Ozone Theatre. However, box office takings suffered from the introduction of television, and Hoyts closed the cinema on 21 May 1960. In 1966 the stalls area was converted into a

youth club A youth center or youth centre, often called youth club, is a place where young people can meet and participate in a variety of activities, for example table football, association football (US soccer, UK football), basketball, table tennis, v ...

(Semaphore Youth Club), which included a

boxing ring A boxing ring, often referred to simply as a ring or the squared circle, is the space in which a boxing match occurs. A modern ring consists of a square raised platform with a post at each corner. Four ropes are attached to the posts and pulled p ...

(closed in 1978). In December 1977, a small cinema opened in the former dress circle, known as the Semaphore Cinema and run by Alan and Fran Hall. This ran until 1 June 1985, after which the building was boarded up. The building was vacant from 1985 to 1993, when the City of Port Adelaide restored the building as the Semaphore Library, which opened on 11 February 1994.

Heritage listing

The building, located at 14 Semaphore Road, was listed on the

South Australian Heritage Register The South Australian Heritage Register, also known as the SA Heritage Register, is a statutory register of historic places in South Australia. It extends legal protection regarding demolition and development under the ''Heritage Places Act 1993'' ...

on 1 September 1983, and was also listed on the

Register of the National Estate The Register of the National Estate was a heritage register that listed natural and cultural heritage places in Australia that was closed in 2007. Phasing out began in 2003, when the Australian National Heritage List and the Commonwealth Heri ...

. The building remains substantially intact from its previous uses, and its state heritage listing notes that "enough interior elements of both periods s a cinemaremain for it to be quite a significant representative of suburban cinemas in their heyday".

References

{{Authority control Cinemas in South Australia Former cinemas Libraries in South Australia Town halls in South Australia Buildings and structures completed in 1884 Lefevre Peninsula South Australian Heritage Register South Australian places listed on the defunct Register of the National Estate