Our American Cousin Played in Sandusky

On May 19, 1875, the play Our American Cousin was presented at the Sandusky Opera House in Sandusky by the Sandusky Amateur Dramatic Association. Admission to the play was fifty cents, and proceeds were donated to the Young Men’s Christian Association. Of course Our American Cousin is best known as being the play that President and Mrs. Lincoln were watching on the evening of  the President’s assassination at Ford’s Theatre on April 16, 1865. 

In 1875 the building known as the Sandusky Opera House was Norman Hall, on the north side of Water Street between Jackson and Decatur.

The building later known as the Sandusky Opera House, the Biemiller Opera House, was not built until 1877. 

Ulysses T. Curran, superintendent of Sandusky Schools, played the part of Lord Dundreary.

Two of the local play’s performers, Miss Jennie M. West and Mr. C.L. Hubbard, would marry in 1877. 

A brief article which appeared in the May 20, 1875 issue of the Sandusky Register reported that, “The play was received in the best possible manner, and that it deserved such a reception will not be gainsaid by anyone who saw it. The members of the Sandusky Amateur Dramatic Association deserve the highest praise for their faultless interpretation of the many difficult characters in the piece.”