User:Donald W Taylor Jr/sandbox

The Ralston Opera House located at Ralston in Pawnee county Oklahoma was constructed in 1902 utilizing locally quarried sandstone. Built by the Harry Brothers, Alfred and Willis, the Opera house utilizes the entire upper story of the original Hardware and Mercantile The building was designed by Edward Bullock, who also designed several other buildings, including the First National Bank building.

Founded on July 31st, 1894, Ralston began as a trading post with the Osage Nation, just across the Arkansas river. With the planned arrival of the railroad, the town boomed and resulted in the construction of the Opera House.

Construction took place from 1900 until 1902, with the first show in December of 1902. The Opera House provided a wide variety of live entertainment, including plays, musicians, bands, magicians, comedians, orators, politicians, boxing and wresting matches, etc. It was also used for larger meetings of fraternal organizations such as the I.O.O.F, MWA, and Masons. It was also a popular place for politicians to present their platforms and was visited by the Oklahoma Territorial Governor in 1905.

As technology progressed the Opera House added a movie projector and showed silent movies in addition to live entertainment. With the arrival of "talking" movies, use of the Opera House dropped dramatically and it officially closed in 1927. It was used for local and school events until WWII when it was boarded up and left to gather dust for several decades.

The building was purchased in the mid 1980s and restoration was begun. Restoration continued through the 1980s and the building was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1987. Unfortunately, the owner died unexpectedly in the early 1990's and the Opera House went through two decades of neglect until acquired by the nonprofit Ralston Foundation in 2017. In poor repair, the building was added to the Preservation Oklahoma list of Oklahoma's most endangered list of historic places in 2018. The Ralston Foundation is currently working to raise the funds for repair and restoration.