In a town that barely had drinking...

In a town that barely had drinking water 30 years before, Childs Opera House was practically a miracle.

On May 27, 1884, it opened with 60 gilded cupids staring down at first-nighters who had come to the premiere of Richard Sheridan’s “The School for Scandal,” starring Mademoiselle Rhea, a Belgian actress. A few nights later, she held the leading role in the light French comedy, “Frou Frou,” for which she was paid a whopping $637.50 for only a few performances.

The theater was built by Ozro W. Childs and designed by Col. A. M. Gray. Its railings were ebony and gold, and gaslights were used throughout the building. The 1,800 wide seats were not upholstered because management thought the audience would be cooler without horsehair and fabric beneath their cultured derrieres in the warm climate of Los Angeles.

The opera house sprang up in what was then the heart of downtown, at 1st and Main streets. For more than 50 years it prospered as the cultural gathering spot for theater and music lovers.

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Boxes cost $15, loges $1.50 and general admission was $1. The Times was so impressed that it said in an editorial: “We want this new opera house to be an educational center for our children where their musical tastes will be refined and quickened.”

Childs had an unquenchable thirst for culture, and he spent $50,000 building the opera house. In sweltering Los Angeles, one amenity that left patrons in awe was the passing around of ice water in crystal pitchers.

A Vermont native, Childs arrived in Los Angeles in 1850, two months after California had become a state. For more than 20 years he owned a tin and hardware shop on Commercial Street, now the site of the new Edward Roybal Federal Building. A few years after he settled here, city officials hired Childs to dig a ditch that would run through the pueblo for about 2,000 feet, bringing water into the settlement for the first time. Everyone called it the Zanja Madre, or Mother Ditch.

But--much like today--the city’s coffers were bare, so Childs agreed to take land for payment. He was given a big tract of land bounded by 6th and Main streets, Pico Boulevard and Figueroa Street (then called Grasshopper Street).

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Childs became not only land-rich, but cash-rich. On the eve of Abraham Lincoln’s election as President in 1860, Childs’ shop became the scene of a chaotic treasure hunt that roused Angelenos, much like the gold rush up north.

After a fire swept through Childs’ store, one of the locals who regularly pitched in to put out fires was poking through the ashes and found $5,000 in gold. Word spread quickly and a large crowd gathered for the hunt.

Childs tried to persuade the man to give back the gold, but the crowd, believing that finders are keepers, swarmed over the smoking rubble to look in vain for more gold.

Childs rebuilt the store and began a new life with his bride, Emeline Huber of Kentucky. They built a three-story, 32-room house on four acres on West Adams Boulevard, nicknamed “Blue Book Boulevard” because of all the society folk who lived there. The house later became the Children’s Home Society.

Emeline bore 10 children. She would, from time to time, ask the streetcar conductors on their way downtown to please match some silk at the fabric store with a sample from her patchwork quilt. The conductors never refused her.

Childs finally sold his hardware store and began a new business in horticulture. He bought another tract of land bounded by Main, Hill, 11th and 12th streets and transformed it into a botanical garden, with exotic trees and magnificent flowers. To pollinate his flowers, Childs imported from San Francisco the first beehives in Los Angeles, at a cost of $150.

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With Childs’ mounting appreciation for plants came a love of other things beautiful and fragile--art, music and theater--ultimately leading to his decision to build the opera house.

He died in 1890. Afterward, his architectural jewel at what is now 112 N. Main St. became known as the Grand Opera House, then as Orpheum and Clune’s Grand Theater before it was demolished in the mid-1930s.

In 1941, a bronze plaque was embedded in the sidewalk near 1st and Main streets to mark the site of the city’s premiere opera house.

But, like much of L.A.’s history, the plaque also vanished. It was stolen about 10 years ago, and the hole where it had been was paved over.

Childs’ name has not disappeared entirely, however. A short street--Childs Way--is named for him on the USC campus.

Instead of culture, a temple of commerce arose on the site of the opera house. A branch of California’s largest bank, Bank of America--was built on the site in 1954. But on Friday, it too will close.