Built in 1889 at a cost of $1,500, this was originally referred to as "
The Town Hall", built to house various types of entertainment - piano concerts, school productions, bazaars, weddings, funerals, even political debates, many as fund raisers for various projects within the community. Enlarged and improved over the years, in 1898 electric lighting was installed.
As well as locally produced entertainment, the hall was the local venue for professional touring theatrical and musical troupes and orchestras which toured North America in the nineteenth century and the first half of the twentieth century.
When the Metropolitan Opera, the Louise Brehany Ballad & Opera Company and Australia's
Royal Lilliputian Opera Company performed here in the early 1900s, the hall became known as the Opera House. In 1916 the Opera House first screened moving pictures, as the local movie house burned that year and moved in its salvaged equipment. It remained a movie theatre, as well as a performing arts venue, for much of the next 90 years.
Operated by a series of owners, the Opera House was remodeled and reopened as the
Land's Theatre in 1979, after which it became a second hand store. Changing hands yet again in 2003, the Opera House was reopened in 2005 as a venue for music and theatre. In 2008 the building was again closed, necessary safety upgrades proving too costly.
Today the Opera House remains empty, locals still dreaming of reopening it as a music and theatre venue.
However, in 2012 an attempt was made to bring the old Opera House back to life, this time as a multi use facility hosting
festivals, workshops, a recording studio, possibly a movie theatre, and just a meeting place to bring in revenue. The news article excerpted below outlines this effort. Unfortunately a
later news article from June of 2012 brought us the news that a rebirth was not in the cards for the venerable old building.
WRAPS wants to get Opera House running again
John Kidder and WRAPS are looking for $600,000 by the end of June to bring the Opera House back to life.
Wendy Coomber | May. 6, 2012
The clock is ticking for the Ashcroft Opera House and for the Winding River Arts and Performance Society (WRAPS) who want to breathe some new life into it.
WRAPS president John Kidder and members of the society have been busy in the past few weeks, making their pitch to local governments like the Village of Ashcroft and the Gold Trail board of education.
Kidder has an option to purchase the Opera House, which sits on the corner of Brink and 4th St., that expires June 30, and he’s trying to raise $600-$700,000.
He’s hoping the Village can come up with $30,000 over two years.
Kidder said the funding would go to WRAPS, which is a non-profit volunteer society. It would be WRAPS, he said, who would be taking out a 10 year lease on the building with the view to owning it by the end of that time.
During that 10 years, they would be offering not only concerts, but marketing the venue for festivals, workshops, a recording studio, possibly a movie theatre, and just a meeting place to bring in revenue.
Kidder expects 46 per cent of their $610,000 preliminary budget will come from government sources. The rest will come from memberships, sponsors and donations.
They are thinking that forming a co-operative is the best way to keep the Opera House community-owned as well as offer shares in return for donations from the members.
Kidder asked the trustees to picture a future five years down the road where Ashcroft has a thriving arts and culture community with the Opera House behind it all.
The Opera House was built in 1889 and has been used as an opera house, a concert hall, a town hall, movie theatre and a new and used store. Martin Comtois restored it in 2008 as the Ashcroft Opera House and presented such acts as Valdy, The Rankins and Garnet Rogers before building code problems forced its closure in 2008
From the Ashcroft Cache Creek Journal