Ely Opera House

Joe Vogel on October 8, 2026 at 10:27 pm

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.)