When miners came to the foothills during the Gold Rush, they needed entertainment, so a lot of actors and performers also came west in the 1850s. Frontier theater is the topic of tonight’s Speaker Night presentation by the Nevada County Historical Society. Leslie Rivers has just finished writing an historical novel called ‘Fiery Star’, and has done a lot of research into the theater scene of that period. She says in many cases, performers made a better living than the prospectors did, but sometimes the conditions weren’t so ideal…

In the 1850s, there was a theater in Nevada City that held 800 people. The well-known performers of the day included the Booth family-the infamous John Wilkes Booth, his father, and his brother Edwin who was considered one of the best Shakespearian actors of the time. Rivers says Edwin Booth will be part of tonight’s presentation…

Tonight’s presentation is at 7pm at Sierra Presbyterian Church in Nevada City. It’s free.

–gf