Ely Opera House
43 E. Camp Street,
Ely,
MN
55731
43 E. Camp Street,
Ely,
MN
55731
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Additional Info
Previous Names: Finnish Opra House
Nearby Theaters
Chase Lachti constructed the 36x80ft Ely Opera House before opening its doors on July 24, 1895 with 16 orchestral musical acts. The building costed a total of $4,000 and originally housed 500 seats, including a 12-foot gallery in the south end of the hall, a cloak room, a 16ft ceiling in basswood, and 16ft stage looms in the north end.
The Ely Opera House is also Ely’s first movie house, running from silent to the first years of sound. It was closed in August 1936.
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50sSNIPES
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Recent comments (view all 1 comments)
The 1914 Sanborn map of Ely shows only a hospital building at the corner of Camp Street and 2nd Avenue, and it’s the wrong size and shape to have been an auditorium. No building on the map is labeled Opera House, but Google’s AI overview of the Temperance Building, which an August 9, 2024 article in The Ely Echo said became the Opera House, says that it was called the Finnish Opera House for a while. The Sanborn map doesn’t show a Finnish Opera House, but it does show a Finlander’s Hall, at what was then 21 E. Camp Street, corner of 1st Avenue. I think that must be the place, as the building is the right size and shape to fit the description of the Opera House.
The modern address of the now-expanded building is 43 E. Camp Street, and it was long occupied by the Ely Bowling Center, Lounge and Arcade (the original builders of the Temperance Building would surely be scandalized at that Lounge) but the Internet reports that the place has been permanently closed (probably due to the coronavirus pandemic.)