THE RHODES OPERA HOUSE. DESCRIPTION OF THE BUILDING

Evening Post, Volume LXXV, Issue 14, 17 January 1908, Page 2

THE RHODES OPERA HOUSE. DESCRIPTION OF THE BUILDING

[nr TSLEGItAPH.— MESS ASSOCIATION.] AUCKLAND, 16th January The Khodes Opera House in Boyeistown, Pennsylvania., the scene of tho terrible disaster this week, when nearly 170 I persons perished by lire, was a small, wooden building, and though dignified by the name "Opera. House" was really nothing but a hall. Mr. Salmon, of Salmon and Chester, sketch artists, now appearing m Auckland, has played in Boyerstown, and in describing the hall to-day stated that it wris one of the 1 small and I antiquated halls which were closed 'after tho great Iroquois th-eatrc fire- in Chicago, when hundreds of halls were closed in various p^arts of Uie country. owing. tq the exits being considered insufficient in thY event of tire. In three or four months the danger was forgotten, and, tho "grafters" getting -to work, the application of sufficient palm oil resulted in<iaV* re-issuo of licenses without anything bsing effected in the way of improvemeutt-). Tho fact that the hall was sjmaH, aud out of date is proved by the cabled statement that the footlights were oil Tamps, for in ajl up-to-date bujldings in that part of Pennsylvania either natur,al gas or electricity is the light medium. Boyerstown has a population of about 4000, and, the Rhodes Hall would hold" about '1000 people. Although the licen-. sing of such "shacks/ 1 as the American;, call them, was secured without adequateexits, tho strictest regaid for the safety of the audience was insisted t «pon in the. main theatres, and the principal theatre in Boyerstown is well provided with ample -jxits. There is no danger in any of the big amusement places. . > ' Thp destroyed hall was largely used for dancing -purposes. ' Mr. Salmon is of opinion that ifc- was the calcium light, and not the kinematograph, that caused the panic. Evidently the connecting tube broke off the reservoir, and the compressed gae escaping through the aperture mado a noise like the hissing of flame, and frightened the audience to such an extent that a panic immediately followed.