A 1950 movie palace turned country music venue where an unidentified spirit named Fred has reportedly turned lights back on, walked an empty stage, and appeared to a neighboring business owner.
224 N Center St, Arlington, TX 76011
Research updated June 2026
Age
All Ages
Cost
$$
Ticket prices vary by performance; check website for current listings.
Access
Wheelchair OK
Downtown Arlington street-level venue with paved access
Equipment
Photos OK
Est. 1950 · City of Arlington Local Landmark · Original 1950 movie palace design retained · Home of Johnnie High's Country Music Revue (1995–2009)
The Arlington Theater opened on February 10, 1950, with a ribbon-cutting by Mayor B.C. Barnes and a double feature headlined by Shirley Temple in *The Story of Seabiscuit*. The building was designed as a full-service neighborhood movie palace: plush seating for 1,200, a balcony, a dedicated cry room for young children, air conditioning, and a 20-foot snack bar with a soda fountain. It was the kind of movie house that communities built in postwar Texas when drive-ins hadn't yet won.
The theater ran first-run films for more than two decades before closing on August 29, 1974, with Fred MacMurray in *The Absent Minded Professor* as its final feature. The building sat mostly empty through the late 1970s and 1980s, with a brief period as a church. Country music singer and impresario Johnnie High purchased the property in 1994 and undertook an extensive renovation to relocate his weekly Johnnie High's Country Music Revue from another Arlington venue. The hall reopened in 1995 to a sold-out crowd of 1,200.
Burk Collins, a local developer and country music enthusiast, purchased the hall in 2009 and continued operating it as a live music venue with upgraded seating — 730 reclining leather seats with cupholders. The City of Arlington designated it a Local Landmark following Johnnie High's death in 2010. Today it hosts country, bluegrass, Americana, and Symphony Arlington performances, and remains one of the few continuously operated entertainment venues in downtown Arlington's core.
Sources
The Arlington Music Hall's ghost has no verified identity, which makes the stories harder to dismiss on standard folkloric grounds. Staff gave the presence a name — Fred — after repeated incidents that began once the building returned to regular use as a music venue. The core pattern: lights that have been switched off come back on when no one is in the building; footsteps move across the stage after it has been cleared for the night.
The most striking account involves a neighbor who ran a restaurant adjacent to the hall. According to reports documented by the City of Arlington's tourism office, the man encountered a well-dressed figure in the building who introduced himself as Fred, answered questions normally, and then was simply not there. The man's description of Fred's clothing placed it out of period.
In 2014 the Dallas-Area Paranormal Society conducted a formal investigation. The team captured electronic voice phenomena consistent with a male presence, and separately recorded a distinct female voice — raising the possibility of a second entity. No historical record has been located that explains who either presence might be. Fred's identity, origin, and connection to the building remain open.
Notable Entities
Arlington Music Hall hosts country, bluegrass, and Americana acts in a 730-seat historic auditorium. The building is designated a City of Arlington Local Landmark and retains much of its 1950 interior character.
Every HauntBound history is researched from documented sources. We clearly separate verified historical fact from paranormal folklore.
Denton, TX
The Campus Theatre opened in 1949 on Hickory Street in downtown Denton, Texas, as a single-screen movie house. After decades of operation and periods of closure, it was saved by the Denton community and now operates as the Denton Film Society's home venue, hosting independent cinema, film festivals, and community events.
Mansfield, TX
The Farr Best Theater opened October 10, 1917, as the first theater in Mansfield, built and operated by Milton May Farr, one of the city's most prominent early citizens. Farr and his family ran the theater continuously for 58 years. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1996 and purchased by the City of Mansfield in 2017 for preservation.
Dallas, TX
Lake Highlands High School opened in the Lake Highlands neighborhood of northeast Dallas and houses a full-scale auditorium used for drama productions. The school is part of Richardson Independent School District. In the early 1970s, according to theater teacher accounts documented by the Lake Highlands Advocate, a student named Elizabeth fell to her death from the stage grid above the auditorium floor.