“Tunnels? Well there's gossip that there was a tunnel between the Million Dollar Theatre basement and the Bradbury building. I've talked to people who say they've seen the entrance. But I've gone looking and haven't found it. Perhaps I didn't have the right keys. And it may be only a utility tunnel. Unknown.” - Bill Counter (https://losangelestheatres.blogspot.com)

 

“Well, several of us had a tour and discussion last week about speakeasies with David, a maintenance guy who has been at the Million Dollar/Grand Central Market complex for 10 years. There evidently was one. The speakeasy had no known connection to the Million Dollar Theatre but was in a part of the basement of the building that was associated with the office building, at the time called the Edison Building. His story:

A speakeasy called The Catacombs was in the north side of the office building basement, along 3rd St. The entrance was a stairway, mostly surviving, that was constructed in a shallow space that had been a newsstand just east of the stairs coming down from the theatre's balcony. An opening date isn't known but it appears that the stairs were added sometime after the building's opening -- the building opened in the year before Prohibition. There's not really anything remaining in the basement other than a bit of wallpaper, several plain looking rooms and the remains of plumbing for several restrooms added for the venue. 

It's now filled in but there was a tunnel connecting the Edison Building basement with the Bradbury building. Although the basement is about 20' deep, the tunnel went down deeper. All that remains is a roughly filled-in hole in the floor slab near the line of the Broadway facade above and about 30' south of 3rd St. The basement continues under the sidewalk perhaps as far as the curb but the hole isn't that far east. The hole is below the building itself, not under the sidewalk. The word from David is that it was a shallow tunnel -- you went down a few steps from basement level and you had to sort of hunch down to clear your head as you went through. David also noted that there had been a second tunnel. This one from the basement of the Grand Central Market, crossing under Broadway to an exit south of the Bradbury Building. Presumably it came up in the basement of the building at 314 S. Broadway, one that at one time was the home of the Central Theatre, as well as other tenants. No idea which end of the tunnel had the speakeasy. https://losangelestheatres.blogspot.com/2019/01/central-theatre.html” - Bill Counter (https://losangelestheatres.blogspot.com) 

 

“Speakeasies are poorly documented, by their nature. I am not aware of any theaters that functioned in this way.” - Kim Esotouric (http://www.esotouric.com)

 

“I don't [think] there's that much information out there since [speakeasies] wouldn't be showing up on a government document like a permit. But our license registry would list pre-existing liquor licenses prior to 1920. There won't be anything after that. Theatres would be listed by year which would give you a number of theatres, their addresses and that's about it.” - Michael Holland (LA City Records)

 

“I don't think we have an easy way for you to research speakeasies.  Speakeasies were by their nature secretive and don't tend to be listed in the City's records.  If you want to research ths through the history of specific properties you could track the ownership of the property through the County Registrar or the building permits issued  for a property through the City's Department of Building and Safety.  But chances are if they were digging a secret tunnel they probably didn't obtain a building permit and if they had to list the building use on the property records they probably didn't say speakeasy.” - Todd (Office of the City Clerk)