Nevada's Historic Opera Houses That Have Survived the Ages

Thompson's Opera House, Pioche

   In addition to saloons, brothels, general stores, assay offices and boarding houses, some western towns, including a handful in Nevada, had one other popular amenity—an opera house or theater.

   That was certainly true in communities such as Virginia City, Reno, Carson City, Eureka, Pioche, and Winnemucca, which each boasted a performing arts facility, that would host touring singers, musicians, theater productions, magic shows, lecturers and, occasionally, even opera.

   While the various opera houses in Reno, Winnemucca and Carson City disappeared over the years, usually due to fires or progress, historic performance halls in Virginia City, Eureka and Pioche have managed to soldier-on into the 21st century.

   Probably the most famous of Nevada’s historic opera houses is Piper’s Opera House in Virginia City. The community’s first opera house, called Maguire’s Opera House, was built in 1863. Four years later, it was acquired by the man most associated with it now, John Piper. That structure burned down during the Great Fire of 1875 and, three years later, Piper erected his second opera house on the same site.

   A fire in 1883, however, destroyed that hall as well, so Piper built the third iteration of his performing arts center on that site in 1885. It is this version, at the intersection of B and Union streets, that continues to stand today.

   Over the years, Piper’s Opera House has hosted lectures by Mark Twain and performances by famed 19th century performers such as Edwin Booth, Lily Langtry, Al Jolson and John Philip Sousa.

   In the late 1990s, the building was purchased by a non-profit group, which has helped to restore it. The opera house continues to operate as a performing arts venue to this day. For more information, go to: https://pipersoperahouse.com/.

   Another of Nevada’s surviving performing arts facility from the 19th century is the Eureka Opera House, also known as the Eureka Theater, is the historic central Nevada mining community of Eureka.

   Built in 1880, the Eureka Opera House served as community hub, hosting touring companies that offered plays, concerts, lectures and balls. In 1915, it was converted into a movie theater offering silent films and continued showing movies until 1958.

   Closed for more than three decades—but maintained by local residents—the opera house was restored to its original splendor by Eureka County in 1993. Today, it continues to host visiting performances, convention groups, and other group gatherings. For more information, go to: https://www.eurekacountynv.gov/recreation-culture-in-eureka-county/opera-house/.

   The last surviving opera house is Brown’s Hall/Thompson’s Opera House in the eastern Nevada town of Pioche. Built in 1873 by Aleck Brown, it hosted dramatic presentations, dances, balls, plays, fraternal organization meetings and other events.

   In 1891, Brown sold the hall to Arthur S. Thompson, a prominent local businessman, who enlarged the stage and renamed it Thompson’s Opera House. Like the Eureka Opera House, Thompson’s installed movie projectors and screens in 1915 and, in the 1930s, the name was changed to the Gem Theater.

   In 1937, a new movie house was constructed adjacent to the old opera house. The new business assumed the Gem Theater name and, by the 1940s, the old building was largely abandoned.

   In 1991, Lincoln County acquired the opera house and began the long process of raising funds to restore it. The work was finally completed in 2009. Today, it is used for private events. For more information, go to: https://piochenevada.com/things-to-do/thompsons_opera_house/.

   In addition to the three Nevada opera houses that have survived, another that should be noted is the Amargosa Opera House located in Death Valley Junction, just a few miles west of the Nevada-California boundary. Built between 1923 and 1925 by the Pacific Borax Company, which mined borate minerals in the area, it was originally known as Corkill’s Hall and served as a community center.

   In more recent decades, it become known as the Amargosa Opera House and was home of legendary dancer Marta Becket, a former New York theater performer, who danced in solo productions there for more than four decades (from her early 40s until she was in her 80s).

   Becket died in 2017 at the age of 92 and her beloved desert opera house, now operated by a non-profit foundation, continues to host performances and is open for tours. For more information, go to: https://www.amargosaoperahouse.org/operahouse/.

The Loneliest Schoolhouse in Nevada

   It’s difficult to imagine what a typical school day might have been like for the students studying in the old-room school house located in the remote settlement of Elgin, Nevada.

   Tucked into Lincoln County’s Meadow Valley Wash in eastern Nevada, the Elgin area was first settled by ranchers in the 1870s. In 1880, a man named James Bradshaw homesteaded a ranch at the lower end of nearby Rainbow Canyon.

   Initially, the small ranches strung along the wash had little need for a school because there were not many children. But that changed after 1903, when the Salt Lake, San Pedro and Los Angeles Railroad built its line through Rainbow Canyon.

   According to the Nevada Division of State Parks (NSP), the railroad established small communities about every five miles along the route, known as “sidings,” where the train could stop to pick up freight or passengers. At many of these sidings, a small depot with various services was built.

   The presence of the railroad brought more people to the region and, eventually, more children, including in the area that became known as Elgin.

   By the late 19th century, the closest school to Elgin was in Panaca, which was 36 miles north. In 1903, a school was established near Kershaw Canyon, but that was also too far for those residing in the lower Rainbow Canyon/Meadow Valley Wash area.

   Two years later, a school was built in Caliente and the Meadow Valley School District was formed. Elgin residents coalesced to start their own school and in the early years the students met in an outbuilding on a ranch.

   In 1921, the district finally had sufficient funds to build a schoolhouse in Elgin and James Bradshaw donated seven acres of his ranch for the building. His son, Rueben, built a one-room, wooden schoolhouse, which opened a year later.

   Two years later, the school was expanded when a small apartment was added to the rear of the building to provide lodging for a teacher. According to the NSP, “after this, finding teachers was never a problem, since the teacher was well paid and housing was provided—but every few years a new teacher would have to be recruited since the young female teachers often  married local ranchers’ sons.”

   Despite its small size, the Elgin Schoolhouse, which housed students for grades one through eight, remained in use until 1967, when the school district finally acquired buses to transport children in the district to schools in Caliente and Panaca.

   After that, the schoolhouse converted to private ownership of the Bradshaw family and, eventually, was turned into a private residence for a family member.

   By the 1980s, the school building was vacant and beginning to deteriorate. In 1998, the Bradshaw family restored the old schoolhouse and offered it to the Nevada Division of State Parks in 2005.

   In July of that year, the school and surrounding area, including vintage playground equipment, was designated an official Nevada State Historic Site, which it remains today.

   Visitors to the site will also find an historic Union Pacific caboose on display. Inside, the school still boasts antique desks, books and chalkboards. The site is open to the public on the first Saturday of each month from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. There is a $3 admission fee. For more information, go to: https://parks.nv.gov/parks/elgin-schoolhouse.

Carson City-Based Writer Stephen H. Provost Has Found His Muse in Nevada

 

   Stephen H. Provost is a prolific writer. Very prolific. A former newspaper reporter and editor in California, Provost, who now resides in Carson City with his wife, Sharon (who is also a writer and editor), has written or co-written at least 50 books, most of which are published through his Capital City-based company, Dragon Crown Books.

   His works span various genres from travel-history and biographical non-fiction to horror, science-fiction, and fantasy in the fiction realm. He and his wife are also two of the hardest-working publishers in the state, who sell their books at dozens of festivals, craft fairs, conferences, and author events throughout Nevada and California.

   Provost’s non-fiction Nevada books include “America’s Loneliest Road: U.S. 50 and the Lincoln Highway in Nevada” and “Victory Road: U.S. 40 and the Victory Highway in Nevada and the West” as well as several books about historic communities (“Carson City Century” and “Goldfield Century”).

   He has also written a pair of book about Virginia City, “The Comstock Chronicles: Sagebrush, Silver, and the Rise of Virginia City,” “Virginia City Then & Now,” as well as several focusing on Mark Twain’s time in that community, “Mark Twain’s Nevada: Samuel Clemens in the Silver State” and “The Adventures of Mark Twain in Nevada” (a children’s book).

   The Silver State has also been the setting for several short story collections and anthologies he has published, including, “Nevada Nightmare’s Eve: Tales Mined from the Depths of Horror,” “Nevada Nightmares Vol. 1 and Vol. 2,” “The ACES Anthology 2023: Stories and Poems from Northern Nevada,” and “The ACES Anthology 2024: Tales from Northern Nevada.”

   The latter four anthologies are collections of short stories containing not only his work and that of his wife but of more than a dozen other Nevada writers such as Bill Brown, Michael Falciani, Janice Oberding, Ken Sutherland, Angela Laverghetta and, in the interest of being completely transparent, several of my short stories.

   In other words, Provost has found Nevada to be fertile ground for his writing.

   For example, in one of his more recent works, the “Comstock Chronicles,” released in late 2024, Provost retraces the story of Virginia City chronologically, incorporating factual and anecdotal history in a way that makes reading the information both fun and enlightening.

   He writes in an engaging style that avoids being dry or boring and incorporates historic images, including photos and from period newspapers, to illustrate the many stories he shares.

   Another of his Nevada non-fiction books, “Goldfield Century,” offers a similar chronological summary of the history of the one-time “Queen of the Mining Camps.” Again, he deftly weaves historic details with fun and entertaining ghost stories, legends and local folklore.

   His “America’s Loneliest Road” book begins at the Utah state line at Baker, Nevada, and tells the story of the Lincoln Highway, America’s first transcontinental highway, which roughly paralleled U.S. 50 across Nevada.

   He shares the various details of the route, including historic accounts and reports of what was needed to make the journey, and describes the historic communities through which the Loneliest Road travels, such as Ely, Eureka, Austin, and Fallon.

   The Provost family (both Stephen and Sharon) of books can be found for sale on Amazon or through the more than four dozen bookstores listed on his company website, https://www.dragoncrownbooks.com/bookshops.

   For more information, go to: https://www.stephenhprovost.com/.