1900’s Ralston Opera House Opens The Doors Once Again!

Our house is complete and now we get to enjoy our remodeled home. I will be starting a new project in October, but in the mean time I noticed a renovation taking place in our neighboring town and once I saw the inside I knew I needed to get the word out about this amazing building and its history. For those of you who live around here, you really need to go check it out if you haven’t already. The doors are usually open while they work and are happy to give a tour.

Ralston is a tiny town five miles away from Fairfax. This town has become known for their high dog population rather than the population of residents. We even made up a song while I was growing up that sounded something like, “Ralston! The town of Hounds!” Needless to say, this town doesn’t have much. However, with the plans this little town has of remodeling the old Opera House and some other historical buildings, Ralston could make a comeback!

Let’s start from the beginning. In the early 1900’s, Fairfax and Ralston were booming oil towns. Several cafe’s, gas stations, entertainment, and even a car dealership was close by. In 1900, they began building the Opera House and finally finished it in 1902. What I have been told is the downstairs of the Opera House has been many different things in the past 115 years, such as a hardware store, furniture store, taxidermy office, antique store and even someones home.

One family owned the Opera House for several years and when the last living relative in the area passed away, the building went up for sale. Due to no interest, it later became the property of the city. In the 1980s, they finally found a buyer and sold the building for just under $700 dollars! Okay, let’s just stop there for a second. In some locations, you would be lucky to find a small apartment for $700 a month, let alone, $700 total!

Okay, back to story time. The new owner of the huge historical building had a dream to turn it back into a functioning theater and business. Do not quote me on this, but I believe his last name was Hunsaker. Hunsaker put in the hours and money to make this building a functioning building again. In fact, he hosted two shows in the theater in the late 1980s. Unfortunately, after the two shows, he passed away and the building was vacant yet again.

The Opera House was then sold to a lady who bought it as her permanent residence. Forgive me for not knowing the name of the lady who bought the building. While growing up everyone referred to her as “the crazy lady”. The new resident lived in the Opera House for 12 years and I have heard she was a hoarder and didn’t keep the cleanest house. I have also heard that she use to chase people away from her building and that she was a paranoid schizophrenic. Now, with that being said, I’m not sure how much is true, or if any was true other then the fact that she did have the entire building full of her belongings. After several years, the owner passed away and the city again had a vacant building.

The city of Ralston has now formed a nonprofit fund to renovate the building to its former glory! They have taken several dumpster loads of trash and debris out of the building and have come a long way toward cleaning it out. Some original's were saved such as some of the arched windows, original wood floors and even the Opera House seating. This area had an earthquake a year or so ago that did some damage to the roof which they have stopped from leaking and are now working on the inside ceiling restoration. This Labor Day, they finally opened the doors again to the public to see their progress! I have to say I was blown away! They served Indian tacos as a fundraiser for their renovations, they also had several antiques to purchase and old framed photos of the building in the early 1900's, but the main attraction was the upstairs theater!

I spoke with Don Taylor about the long term plan for the building and what it would look like. Taylor said they would like to open the downstairs again as an antique store or some kind of shop utilizing the large store front windows. The upstairs would be used as a possible wedding venue for seating up to 200, theater for the community, family reunions, and a building that everyone could one day enjoy. The City also owns the two buildings to the right of the Opera House. Taylor said “as farfetched as it sounds I would like to make this area a small Eureka Springs. We have a River close by that we aren’t taking advantage of. We could put a zip line in across the river to use as a tourist attraction for example.”

The two buildings to the right of the Opera House will get worked on after the Opera House is closer to completion. They would like to redo the store fronts of these properties to make the small town of Ralston more appealing. The red trimmed building they would like to house a restaurant one day. The building next to that is completely beyond repair but would like to open it up for a courtyard area as an outdoor venue for picnics, family reunions and small gatherings.

I’m sure that you are tired of me rambling by now so let me show you the pictures of what we saw today!