History of the Keator Opera House
The Barber Block was erected in 1864 on the site of Uncle Jeb Barber's famous Great Western Store.
Originally seating upwards of 1,000, for nearly 50 years the Opera House was home to a wonderful range of entertainment, musical reviews and recitals, plays, operas, lecturers, conventions, and exhibitions. As the center of community activities, it provided space for village meetings, a roller skating rink, a women's bicycle riding academy, bare-knuckle boxing matches, and basketball. A marathon walking contest in the 1870's was won by a local man who circled the Opera House floor 800 laps!
The Great Western, c. 1857 The theater season ran from September 'til June. Touring groups of actors, called stock companies, staged performances, often hiring villagers for minor roles. Over the years, the favorite professional plays included J. Jefferson's "Rip Van Winkle" and H.B. Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin." But rural audiences really preferred old-fashioned melodramas and farces; classics like Shakespeare were performed infrequently.
But the Keator Opera House, renamed by new owners after Jed Barber's death, was notable for homegrown productions, written, directed, and acted by locals. Melodramas like "Aunt Charlotte's Maid,""Slippery Day,""Poppleton's Predicaments," and "Better Late than Never" were performed by evolving casts, often including several generations of the same Homer families.
In 1877 a huge Brass Band Convention was held in Homer and the Opera House. Famous bandsmen from all over the northeast came for a week of parades, contests, and stage shows. Local musicians served as inspiration for a young coach maker at Brockway named Patsy Conway, a Homer boy, who became one of the nation's most famous bandmasters, often mentioned in music history along with John Phillip Sousa. Conway often played cornet with the Homer Cornet Band at Keator.
Among famous lecturers gracing the Opera House stage was Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) who visited in 1871, sponsored by the Homer Literary Society. Clemens' talk was humorous, if not a bit racy, according to contemporary accounts, though reaction to his talk among Homer's pious, church-going audience can only be guessed. Clemens was paid about $100 ($800 in modern currency) for the evening.
On the wilder side, General Tom Thumb's raree show, troops of Italian gymnasts, and traveling minstrel shows, including one of the first African-American groups all visited Keator Opera House.
The largest crowds were drawn by gala reviews, pantomimes, and formal dances organized and staged as fund-raisers for Homer's fire companies. A tradition spanning 150 years, these events were the predecessors of today's chicken BBQ's and Firemen's Field Days.
These shows would include brass band overtures followed by singers, tableaus, pianists, Punch and Judy puppet shows, and one act plays. Songs included popular tunes like "Let Me Dream Again,""Love Me and the World is Mine," and "Brother Noah Give Out Checks for Rain." Door prizes were awarded each evening ($10 in gold).
"Magic Lantern" projector On more serious notes, the Opera House was used for political rallies, temperance meetings, benefits for veterans, and teachers' exams. In the late 19th century, "moving pictures" in the form of magic lantern and stereopticon shows were introduced, projecting travelogues and news stories.
In 1907, following a disastrous fire in a similar opera house in Doylestown, village elders ordered the 3rd floor theater closed, to be replaced with a new Town Hall Theater on North Main Street that opened the following year. Though the space was used into the 1920's for basketball, it has remained essentially closed since then, reopened only in the spring of 2003.
As you tour Keator Opera House note the gas valves controlling house and foot lights (Keator was never electrified). Back stage a metal sheet attached to the wall was used to simulate thunder. Faint remains of the rear stage wall painting appear to be the Catskill Mountains thunder and mountain views probably for performances of "Rip Van Winkle."
Around the theater and ticket office are signatures, initials, comments, and accounting memos penciled on plaster walls, vivid reminders of the theater's history and its connections in today's community.
Brochure Info. from PK Publishing, 7 James St., Homer, NY 13077