Flossie Goes to the Opera – Alliance, Ohio (1907)

In November of 1907, Flossie Farmer was busy in Alliance, Ohio.

Flossie sent a postcard to her friend, Grace Christopher, who lived in Lisbon, Ohio.

(Alliance is a city in northeast Ohio, near Akron, Ohio, about 50 miles southeast of Cleveland. Alliance was growing rapidly as an industrial and transportation center in the early 20th century.

Lisbon, a smaller town southeast of Alliance, was about 25 miles away.)

Flossie writes that she is “so busy I have no time to write…” and that she will not be able to visit at Thanksgiving.

Her busy life included cultural events as she reports, “I was at the opera last Friday night.”

Like many towns in the US, before the rise of movie theaters, Alliance boasted an Opera House.

The original Opera House collapsed in a spectacular fashion in the 1880’s, but the new opera house that Flossie visited has been re-purposed as a library and is still in use.

The postcard from Flossie is illustrated by a picture of “The Waterfall”.

Beneath the picture, Flossie inscribed a verse urging her friend, Grace, to remember her.

(These sentimental verses were popular inscriptions in autograph books that millions of young women maintained.)

I have not subscribed to any genealogical websites (although my curiosity about our postcard personalities may lead me to do so), but I find on-line references to persons named “Farmer” in the area around Alliance, Ohio.

We trust that Flossie (Florence) and Grace celebrated a happy Thanksgiving and prospered in the early years of the twentieth century.