IT was, by any stretch of the imagination, an unusual building to house a cinema and probably one of the few anywhere that overhung the adjoining street by some distance.

However to show films of cowboys and Indians, Laurel and Hardy or perpetual heroine Pearl White was not the original purpose of the property that became the Apollo Cinema in Park Street, Worcester.

It had a rather more religious leaning than that.

It began life as the Zion Chapel and was opened by the United Methodist Association on the Sunday before Christmas Day in 1838.

It was built to cater for a new suburb which had grown up just outside Sidbury Gate and seated only 167.

Although the chapel had an imposing frontage added in 1845, it remained on the small side and had to close in 1910 when the United Methodists withheld their grant.

Cue the arrival of the movie moguls – or rather the fledging fathers of the cinematographic industry, which was just getting going in the early 1900s.

Most of the new-fangled cinemas began life in converted premises and so it was with Worcester’s Apollo Cinema which morphed out of the Zion chapel.

Despite its new found usage, it remained a bijou building with a tiny gallery.

One of the other disadvantages was that the film projector could not be set far enough away from the screen.

So to get a decent “throw”, the projection box was built out through a window to hang over the street, from where it was accessed via a ladder.

It must have been a fairly precarious location for the projectionist, especially as in those early days film was highly inflammable, so a bucket of water had to be kept immediately above the projector.

After all, engulfed by flames in an enclosed space hanging over a street was no place to be.

For many years the Apollo was run by the Evans family.

SF Evans, grandson of the founder, later recalled: “My grandfather converted the chapel; my mother was in the pay box; my father was the cinema operator; and my two older brothers took the tickets and sold chocolates and cigarettes during the interval.

“When it was twice nightly I had to rewind the film for the second showing – by hand.”

The Apollo was never converted for sound so closed in 1931 when other cinemas began to show talkies.

But it was good while it lasted. Entrance at matinees was 2d or, for children, two glass jam jars. These used to pile up in the back yard for the ragman to collect.

The children’s Saturday morning shows were especially popular, usually ending as a beautiful girl faced mortal danger with the caption: “To be continued next week”.

That was assuming the projectionist hadn’t got so excited he’d fallen out of his nest into Park Street.