“I knew that getting inside the Providence was not a simple task, but I had no idea that it involved two hours of trekking through old drainage tunnels and part of the active sewer; it even involved sliding down a dislodged drain pipe using a rope. I learned from Jacob, one of the urbex guys, that all the manholes around the building itself had been welded shut, and all of the adjoining underground accesses had been filled in with concrete.
The roundabout path the urbex crowd took ended at one of those concrete walls, probably a good two hundred feet below the surface, and from what I gathered it was probably one of the oldest such barriers. Over the years leaky drainage had worn it away enough to allow some enterprising individual enough room to chip out a hole big enough to shimmy through. I’ll admit, it wasn’t pleasant, scooting through a hole barely an inch or two bigger than my shoulders for a good three feet, but I’m more than willing to do it again after what I’ve seen.
Once through the hole, I could sense a change in the sewers immediately. The air was different…older, perhaps, or just less polluted? Trekking along through a winding series of tunnels, seeing a few more of the concrete walls, we finally came to a lone ladder standing at the end of one of them, and through this is how we came up into the small plaza in front of the tower. I had later wondered why we hadn’t hurried out of sight, but Moe, another of the urbex-ers, told me that no modern cameras worked right around the building, so there weren’t any watching.
My breath had caught as I stared at the building for the first time without any walls or fences, the dark shape looming high above in the faint moonlight, quickly becoming obscured by clouds as a storm system approached. I was, for a time, unable to move, taking in all the shadowed details I could, my eyes tracing every curve and corner, finally landing on the theater’s marquee, and then the doors and windows below it.
The windows were covered from the inside with age-yellowed paper, preventing me from seeing inside, but through the accumulated dust, I saw it, the sign that mentioned the “Studies” room. I could finally move and breathe again upon seeing the sign, and I approached it, reaching out and touching the glass that separated me from it. Almost without thinking I wiped the dust away, taking in the sign that had mystified explorers for years.
Fishing my recent pawnshop purchase from my pack, I quickly adjusted the focus on the 35mm camera and snapped a couple of pictures of the sign. I’d bought up a half dozen rolls of film, too, as hard as it is to find these days, but I wasn’t about to come this far unprepared.
Getting my attention, I was finally drawn away from the sign by the urbex-ers, who were starting around the left side of the building, to along the side of the theater. With the front doors to the apartments and the theater still tightly boarded up and chained, the only known entrance was apparently in the back loading area.
Sure enough, after turning the corner and moving under the overhanging roof that hung off the building, I saw a pair of large garage doors, both lowered, but off to one side was a normal looking door. The glass on this door was shattered, however, the remains still littered around the ground outside, but more importantly, the doorknob was resting next to the door. With a grin and an exaggerated flourish, Jacob had pushed the door open, the hinges squeaking loudly as the way inside was opened.
I could feel the building looming above me as I stepped inside, my heart beating wildly as I moved my flashlight in all directions, trying to take in everything at once. Finally getting myself under control, I took in the loading area and garage, seeing several wooden crates, some still intact, others broken into splinters, but their contents appeared to have been taken elsewhere.
Following the lead of the urbex guys and snapping photos of everything I could, we soon found ourselves in the halls behind the theater, and then coming out onto the stage itself. Again I came to a stop, staring in awe at just how well preserved the fixtures were. There was hardly any damage at all, in fact, only a few chairs in the front rows seemed to have some tears, and of course the stage floor was scuffed and some of the wallpaper was hanging loose, but otherwise the grandeur of the theater was easy to see. The 1920s opulence was evident, with the rich golden light fixtures, absolutely massive crystalline chandelier, and expensive stitching on the chairs. Cobwebs and dust coated practically everything, however, and the brilliant sheen of the golden fixtures had long since faded.
We spent perhaps an hour just taking in the theater, myself taking even more photos, running through two whole rolls, and indeed, it seemed that any anxieties I had felt previously had vanished. The urbex-ers confirmed that they’d felt the same kind of thing I’d read about online, that this place was like a safe haven, nothing near as creepy as the rest of the accessible areas.
Moving from the grand theater, we started our deeper delve by returning to the rear hallway, but continuing passed to the dressing and storage rooms. Almost as soon as we were out of sight of the theater, I felt an uneasiness settle in, and indeed, the air seemed to grow heavier. I noted that Jacob, Moe, and Omar were quite a bit more alert now, with at least one of them seeming to always be looking behind us.
The dressing rooms were in disarray, with old clothing and furniture scattered around like someone had been searching for something, with no care given to where anything had landed. I noted that the light bulbs at the dressing table were all busted, and the mirror too was shattered, though that seemed to have been done by something roughly the size of a human fist.
The storage rooms were likewise torn apart, with old costumes strewn about, and old props and stage pieces piled haphazardly in one corner, many of them broken, their once vibrant paint faded with age and layers of dust.
As we walked, in a low voice, I had inquired as to what they thought of the sign out front, and if they had any ideas about the mysterious “Studies” room. The consensus seemed to be that it was just a bad joke. All of the accessible areas of the building had been searched thoroughly, though the next room they took me to had once been considered a possibility. It was a lounge, likely for the crew or even the stage performers perhaps, with a trio of empty bookshelves on one side of the room, as well as an old radio and record player, looking like something from the 40s, though, and several couches and lounge chairs. There had even been a small bar in the room, though most of the booze bottles had either gone missing or had been shattered and piled in the corner.
Omar related a brief story about the room while I explored it, about how he’d seen some old newspaper clippings from actors during the 20s who were interviewed and had mentioned studying their lines in the lounge, but nobody had found anything in the room that could have led to the apartments; physically the room was not even beneath them anyway.
I took a few moments to look over the books that remained on the shelves, most of them showing their age. Blowing some dust away, I took note of the titles, and a picture just in case. I likewise looked through the pile of books in the floor, some falling apart when I picked them up, others with ink so faded I couldn’t make out a thing on the pages.
Heading out of the lounge, I paused and looked back down the hall we had come from, my eyes lingering in the gloom around the beam of my flashlight. Had I seen something dart around the corner? Was there someone else in the building with us? Or were my eyes starting to play tricks on me? Feeling a chill down my back, I hurried to catch up with the others, glancing behind as we traversed the halls leading to the apartment lobby.
From the rear halls, we took a brief look at the restrooms, then the theater’s lobby area, which was no less grand than the theater itself, and being back within sight of the theater, through the large double doors of the main entrance, seemed to ease the wariness I felt. The red carpet was stained with age and countless footsteps, was threadbare in some spots, but again, the structure was very much intact, aside from a few dislodged light fixtures and the cash registers that had been knocked off the refreshments counter and into the floor. The ticket booths were mostly pristine as well, aside from the wooden panels that had been secured over their windows.
From here the group headed across the wide foyer to another set of doors, one of which rested on the floor, having been ripped from its hinges, perhaps to get the path open. Peering in along the flashlight beams, I could see that the red carpet continued, but that the lobby area beyond was much different in it’s layout, containing several old, but at one time, expensive, couches and coffee tables, covered in old, ages magazines that looked to be from the mid 50s, around the time the place had been closed down.
It was at this point I heard a distinct rumbling sound, and for a moment I thought it might have been from the building itself, brief images of a section of the roof collapsing atop me going through my mind, but then Moe commented that it was thunder. They picked up the pace then, telling me that we couldn’t waste too much more time before heading back, because if the storm came in too heavy, the route back would require swimming.
With our new time limit in mind, we gave a quick once-over of the lobby, noting the old log book on the counter, spotted with age and old coffee stains, as well as the old phone and radio. The office behind the counter was ransacked like the other rooms, and, I noted, none of the hangers in the key box mounted by the overturned desk were there, just the old, faded and peeling tape with the apartment numbers above the hooks. Curiously I noted that all of the labels for the third floor were missing.
From there we approached the rear of the lobby, where the elevator waited. The car itself was on our level, the old style gate pushed closed to one side, but the entire thing was filled with a mishmash of old furniture, and, it appeared, cement had been poured atop the pile, partially covering it and making it impossible to move without heavy tools.
They showed me the stairwell entrances next, first the two in the corners on the wall with the elevator, then the ones toward the boarded up entrance doors. Like the elevator, all four of them were filled with furniture, what I could only guess had once belonged inside the apartments above, and covered with cement. I could make out a few tiny holes around the edges and near the roof, but there was no way anybody could get through them.
Another rumble of thunder set us in motion, and by the time we had passed back through the garage and closed the door, the first raindrops were starting to fall. The journey back through the tunnels was swift, though I was barely able to retain most of my memories of the trip back, so intent was I upon what I’d just seen inside the Providence.
It has been a few days since our return, the day following spent mostly in bed as I was bone tired from the hours of trekking beneath the city and then through the magnificent building that had for so long captivated my attention.
Now that I know the way inside, I intend to venture back there more often. I don’t know about the stories of things lurking inside; I may have saw something, true, but it could just as well have been my imagination playing tricks with me. The Providence is, for lack of a better word, creepy.
And despite the creep factor, I remain drawn to it. There is a way to reach those apartments, and I must see what the rest of the building is like. There has to be a way into the basement as well, perhaps in the parts of the theater below the stage that they didn’t show me. I’m picking up my photos this afternoon, and perhaps they’ll give me some clue as to where I can search next.
Where there’s a will, there’s a way, and my will is strong!
Geeze, that sounded better in my head, but reading it here just makes it sound corny…”
-Ashton B. Corbett
