104869

-- -~ --~ 154 W.OPERA MainHOU...., roE (derrolisbed) LEHI IEHI. UI'AH CDUNlY - /5'1 tJ. #btit uni O~(a H(JlI5('. Lek; / Iftk Gvll7 I . (dt'lfIolisW) ,JUL 1 • IWI l 'T ,\ II !'IU:SS ,\SS()CI.\Tlo,\ ( 'Iip"i,,); St:rria Pholl\.!: [phone] I. I-: Ii I FilE!:: tppe'r a House was Lehi social center:.f or 40 years 1y RICHARD VAN WAGONER Drugetore.--theheartofWetltemmedicine -- were in many case. owned and operated by docton. Dr. Calvin L. Seabright was Lehi's first known druggist. Although he waa a pharmacist and not a m@C!icaJdoctor,aftertraining young David Ellingson to manage hi. store Seabright"li tted out a doctor's satchel and could be seen on the go day and night to the homes of the sick,With help from' competent midwive•• Seabright delivered thousands of Lehi ba- . i bies. ,' I' ,i 'I! ' ; Seabright established tho Lehi Drolf Store in the early 1870. in a frame building at 154 Weat Main. The building, which wee first owned by the Lehi Union Exchange, came under control of the People', Co-op in 1880. After the Co-op oold the property to Loui. Garffin 1887, Seabright moved the drug .tor. two doon weat into the fonner Gudm und Gudmundoen Jewelry Store (164 W.. tMain). Lauritz (Loul.) Garff, Lehi merchant, needed largerquarten for hi, pneralltor•. H. alao believed the town needed a new amuaement halloo h. decided to combin. the two bu.in..... into one facility. In the summer of 1887 laborera I.t to work razing the old Lehi Drug Store and erecting a new two-itary .tructure on the ait... The con.truction techniques and material. uaed by build.n Carl CarllOn, J. Wiley Norton, and John AndrellOn were .tet.of-the-art for that era. Th. rnu.ive wan. of blue-rock lim .... .ton., from the Lak. Mountain., were more than one foot thick. The floor joist., twelve inche. in diameter, were full length trees of . native pine (resistant to both rot and insect damage). Planks were three inchel thick, twelve inch•• wide, and up to twenty~five feet long. The building's lower floor, which housed Oartf Meri:antile, WII 60 by 40 feet. The upper stOry, officially known as the Lehi Opera HoulO but popularly called "G.rtr. Hall,'hada40by26footategebuiltontothe north end, which WII .upported by wooden pillar•. Ace... to the ..cond .tory wu provided by • wide wooden .tairway on the we.t aide of the building. The largeetofthe two downatein room. initially wao GartfMercantile. AI hi. health began to deteriorate at the tum of the century he &old hi. mercantile to a group or bu.in...men repreeented by Abel J. Evan. , and Jam .. H. Gardner. The Lehi Mercantile Company opened _ j·.dooreonJan.2,1901, withJohnL.Snow \ t:le conc~ i-n'. flnt manager. In 1904 he wu L eh·t 'I t d ~es er ays ' replaced by James M. Kirkham who in tum wal luperseded by Joseph F. Darius in 1906. year's revenue. He asked for a 1889 rebate and a fairer rate for 1890. The council refused his initial request, but later re~ ' r ~ "'n::~~••~~~_ _............. " Six month. later L, E. Adams was se- len ted to keep the popular social hall in lected tomanage the troubled firm. In Sep~ business. tember 1907 the company's board of dirKFor more than 70 years the Lehi Opera tora voted to go out of business. House hosted a wide variety of entertainThe smaller downstairs room was first ments and other social functions. Dances, rented by the MIA for ita reading room and concerts, Old Folks programs,church meet~ civil government classes. In the spring of ings, MIA fairs, political activities, and 1896 it became the home of Ord Brothers Kirme., Festivals wore held there. Clothing ~tore. Local thespians, who had had few outAfter this firm moved elsewhere, the lets for performing since the demise of the Lebj Rustler, a local newspaper established Lehi Dramatic Club many years before, itself there. When the newspaper went organized the Lehi Home Dramatic Comunder the following year the space became pany in 1895. Their first production was an office for Dr. G. T. Groody. Two months "Tony the Convict,' later, however, Charlie Umbach had a barThey later staged such plays as "'The ber .hop there. Leading Role," "Hickory Farm," "My Turn Bucce•• ive barbers working this shop Next: "Jack O'Diamonds" and "'The RaidIncluded H. M. Snow (1898), James Cooper eu," (1900), and C. Cedautrom (1903), In 1904 While townspeople appreciated local the le.ue wu John Anderson who main- entertainment, the level of anticipation for tained a failor .hop there. traveling troupes and variety programs was Th. opening event of the $9,000 Lehi i far greater. I • Opera House on Chri.tmu Eye 1887 w.. a k • Most of the play. produced by these Grand B.n<attendea'})y 'more than 400 ' groups were melodramas ~- gut-gripping, people. lJ1le inaugural drama on Jan. 3D, emotionally-charged material with evoca1888,aSpringvillecompany'sproductionof tive titles like "The Widow's Victim: -A "Cut Upon the World' played before a full Husband's Vengeance," "Ten Night' in a house of fxcited Lehi theater-goers. Bar Room" and '"The Romance of a Poor Th. wooden chain, which could be repo- Young Man." .itfoned, were fastened to a sloped frameOne of the more spectacular shows to be work alloWing persons in the rear tosae the staged in the opera house was the Novemperform.~ce. The extreme back row, ("Toad ber 22, 1894, Rusco & Swift', production of Heaven'" to the young people who usually Harriet Beecher Stowe's immortal "Uncle sat there) became the forerunner of the Tom's Cabin: The show carried all its own building'.. balcony. scenery, band and orchestra. And the huDanquart Weggeland of Salt Lake City. man cast was supported by a collection of one of the arti.t. who later painted the animals which included a Shetland pony, mural.in~idetheSaltLakeTemple,painted an "Egyptian donkey from the streets of the first six .ets of scenery for the Opera Cairo,· a Siberian blood hound, and a trick HOUle in early 1888. alligator. Eventuany at least twelve units of reo The variety theater spawned scores of veraibleback-dropaeenery-·onesideohow- performers who traveled constantly from , .. . ing the indoor ecene and the other aide the town to town. wowing local audiences with matching outside Beene ~. were painted. their music, singing, dancing, comedy and These acen•• were rol1ed up and stored and specialty performances. '. The Lehi Opera House was built in 1887 on the site now occupied by the could quickly be changed to obtain the Amateur boxing and wrestling matches Lehi Drug Store. at 154 West Main. , deaired. effect •. , were held in the opera house, some of them ... The popularityofthe Lahl Opera HOUle reportedly promoted by Frank James, . The following week the largest crowd in Georgia.'" quickly grew. Lehi City, wishingtoenhance brother of the notorious Jesse James. the establishment's history was drawn to a The evening ended on a memorable note itorevenuOl,neorlytaxedtheplaeetodeath. In the spring of 1896 pioneer photogra- ' missionary benefit. Thedrummingwasdone when Messra. Gaddie and Ingalls staged a In late 1889 GarlT appeared before the pher C. R. Savage gave an entertainment by the Republican Drum Corps followed by telephone communication that-Wouldmake city counc::il to .how that his business li- consistingofview8 he called "'oxy·hydrogen the "Mormon Mission ary Minstrels,· Edison', hair poke through his hat,' The cense equaled 50 percent. of the previous Lime Lights." claimed to be the "best show this side of ~ESTERDAYS on page 3 Jy .~ ->tows ad!d pUB laB -wo >pBlJ, WV aw! lB SIlM 1!J! uaAalalL Wll I lnq awq al{l pa>tl llM at{ Sll ~u!t{~r la,{ W!l{ aas Ull;) I 'al 'l{~nlll 01 pallllls al lap[!Maq al{l III pa , : >t;)Bq sdot{s d!l{;) pu paAlas sauo al{l ala, ',u°1S al{l JO lS~ at{ Continued from front page . I I '.• " , two inventors had rlgged a line that alloVJed them to speak to S. W. Ross, a Lehi missionary then in Ireland. "Cunning the Jail Breaker" entertained in the opera house with his escape routines in the summer of 1906. "How can he escape from Iron cage," the local newspaper asked, "when locked and chained, his feet and hands fastened with hand cuffs; how he liberated himself from the pillory and escaped from the dry goods box, when nailed in and the box afterwards roped, is certainly a feat our people have not seen before." ~ Virgil Peterson, who as a boy . 1ifIIIIIM" ,I, , I, I I . I .. : ... , ~ attended many events in the Lehi Opera House, was most impressed by a hypnotist. To advertise his act the man rendered a woman insensible and had her lie all day long in a store window. Young boys, after watching such a display, were more than anxious to shell out their money for the show that evening. On stage the beguiling woman entertained by reading people's minds and telling them of their future. Peterson remembers her asking people to "fill out a card with ques· tions and then sign it." Jess Gurney, who worked out at Topliff, asked "What will I be doing tomorrow?" The soothsayer answered correctly, "If everything goes right;:' you'll be out to Topliff." Another fellow asked how his mother-in-law was . "You don't care anything about your mother-in-law," she replied: "You're not worried about how she is at all." Again the psychic was correct. The man was single and did not have a mother-in-law. By the turn of the century moving pictures were fast bE:Coming the rage of the day. To read how this affected the Lehi Opera House,join me here again next week. ------,-.--- ~ .