Empress Theatre (California) repainted and the "Empress Theatre" sign was painted into the pediment. Its window panels were uncovered and refurbished, seats from Fox Theatres were salvaged and installed, gypsum decoration was re-gilded, and period-appropriate carpeting was laid. The Empress thrived throughout the decade. 1989 On Tuesday October 17, the Loma Prieta earthquake, measuring 6.9 on the moment magnitude scale, shook the San Francisco Bay Area; the Empress Theatre was not spared. To repair damage from the quake and make the building seismically safe for use was a task so monumental that it caused the theatre to sit vacant and derelict for nearly
1989 Loma Prieta earthquake wave-like manner over a distance of several feet. When electrical power to the stadium was lost, someone drove a police car onto the field, where an officer used the car's public address system to advise that the game had been postponed. After the shaking subsided, many of the players on both teams immediately searched for, and gathered, family and friends from the stands before evacuating the facility. The October 18, 1989 edition of NBC's "Today" that covered the earthquake ran until noon Eastern Time. Bryant Gumbel, Jane Pauley and Deborah Norville anchored from Chicago (where they had planned to originally