The Cremorne / Midway Plaisance / Midway Theatre

771 Market St. | map |

Opened: This second floor venue opened sometime around 1888 as the Cremorne Variety Theatre. It was on the south side of the street between 3rd and 4th. 

Capacity: Around 1,500. 

The Black fighter Peter Jackson fought at the Cremorne in June 1888. Thanks to Mark Reed for his research about Jackson for an extensive post on the San Francisco History to the 1920s Facebook page. 

 

The June 5, 1888 Examiner article about the fight. 

Art Siegel was researching early variety theatres and found "an amusing article written by an intrepid reporter who was 'shocked, shocked' to find these 'theatres' in our fair city." The story in the April 4, 1892 San Francisco Call that he located via the California Digital Newspaper Collection website mentions a number of 'dives' by name and offers a discussion of that new usage of the word. The Cremorne was a major focus of the reporter:  

"CRIME HATCHERIES. Life in San Francisco's Dens of Depravity. PLACES WHERE VICE RUNS RIOT. Jack Hallinan's Notorious Cremorne Theater. A PLACE THAT SHOULD BE CLOSED. Other Vile Resorts in This City Where Youth Is Corrupted and Women Slowly Slain... Life In the dives of San Francisco: What is it like? Tell us not that it is picturesque. Say not that it is permissible; that the low and vulgar will be low and vulgar, no matter what is said or done. Say that it is vile, and you have spoken of it in fit terms— sharp, short and to the point. Vile is the word. 

"There are different kinds of dives. There is the underground hall, where the fetid air reeks with a stench that never leaves the place night or day; where young maidenhood is debauched; where innocent youth becomes laden with foulness; where robberies are concocted; where men are slain; where licentiousness rules supreme. There is the hall just off the street, perhaps a step or two up from the sidewalk, which is just so many steps downward into Hades for those who go in as participants. Here, possibly, it is a little cleaner in a physical sense, though morally it is just as foul and loathsome as the dive-cellar. Then there are a few places where one goes upstairs in order to gain entrance. So far as good air and decency are concerned nothing is gained by the ascent. The upstairs places are just as vile as those in the cellars. Often they are worse.

"But they are all dives, whether above or below ground. The 'Century Dictionary' gives the definition if a dive as that of 'a disreputable place of resort, where drinking and other forms of vice are indulged in, and commonly vulgar entertainments are given.' So it may be in a cellar or in an attic. If it conforms to the foregoing definition putting it upstairs does not let it escape from the appellation of 'dive.' But there is a bitter name for them — crime hatcheries. That is what they are. The police records will prove it. Now, there are a great many dives in San Francisco. If there were only one, that would be one too many. Some of them are hidden away out of sight. Others flaunt themselves brazenly on our leading streets, their blatant bands of harsh music sending forth their discordant notes nightly.

"These places which greet the youth of the city with attractive signs, inviting them to come in and begin a course of vice, are maintained on such streets as Market and Kearny, staring the public in the face, saying, 'We are here to stay; what are you going to do about it?..' The dive-keepers have political pulls. They know how to get off easily when it comes to threatened punishment. They are experts at evasion of the law. They have plenty of money, and use it more unscrupulously than does any other class of corruptionists. They are moral lepers. And yet these same dive-keepers have the support of the law, after a fashion. To uproot them one most strike deep. It should be done. They should be uprooted, and with no tender hand; but mercilessly, just as they slay and corrupt. 

 

"There is the Cremorne Crime Hatchery. It is the worst of all. It would be closed to-morrow by the police if they had the power. The Police Commissioners refused to give their consent to license it; but it is licensed just the same. How is that done? Never mind, just now. It is done— rest assured of that. For there is money behind the Cremorne— big money. The Call will tell all about these things in the course of time. In this chapter it will merely introduce the reader to the Cremorne, the Star, the Eureka, the Olympic, the Palace Varieties, the Elite and other dives. See how vile they are! 

 

"TOBIN'S APPROVAL... R. J. Tobin, president of the Board of Police Commissioners, was told that The Call was collecting data for a crusade against the dens of depravity in this city. 'Good... We have had a great deal of trouble with the dens— a great deal. We know that in those places much of the crime that is committed in this city originates. We know that they are a stench in the nostrils of the community. We have done everything in our power to close the most disreputable of them, but we cannot go further than the law allows to go...' 

 

"WHAT THE CHIEF SAYS... 'These dives and dance-halls are like so many festering sores on the body politic, and were the power mine not one of the disreputable places would be open to-day.' It was P. Crowley who spoke, Chief of the Police Department of San Francisco. 'Some of them are vile and filthy places; none of them fit to live in a respectable community... Yes; some of them are worse than others. Some have bad criminal records. In some crime has been committed, even to murder... I can tell you which causes us the most trouble. That is the Cremorne, but the Bella Union, the Eureka music-hall and half a dozen others are just about as bad. The Cremorne is the most dangerous to the community because of its prominent location on Market street. But I look upon them all as so many plague-spots in the community... Dives cost the city more in a year than any other nuisance it has to contend against. Taxpayers ought to put their feet down on the dives and stamp them out of existence."

 

"HALLINAN'S CRIME HATCHERY. The Most Disreputable and Dangerous Resort in the City. Jack Hallinan's Cremorne at 771 Market street is the worst of the dives because it flaunts its iniquity in your very face and stretches out its sin-slimy arms to the gilded youth. You need not look down to see it when passing, nor search to find it out. Its hideous features, veiled only with the robes of sensuality, meet you boldly in the street, and at night a blare of trumpets rings out upon the air from the balcony above to tell you that the painted, gaudy-dressed, short-skirted harpies and their male accomplices have assembled in the upper halls to filch your pockets and steal away your self respect. Five hundred men and boys crowd the place nightly, and often this number is greatly increased. A nominal admission is charged here, but the iniquity is so much greater that its patrons do not mind the added cost. 

 

"There are two grades at the Cremorne. On the main floor are the accommodations for those who have only a few dimes or perhaps a dollar to spend. The twenty 'lady' waiters here mostly wear long skirts. They are homely, as a rule, though blase and immodest enough to suit the vilest of mankind. Men of brawn and muscle, sailors, laborers and shabby loafers congregate here. Beer is only 5 cents, and drunkenness prevails. A gallery lines three of the walls. On each side are the 'boxes,' foul, dirty little pens, with lace curtains in front. The most attractive and short-skirted of the waitresses 'work' the 'boxes.' A quart bottle of stale beer drawn from the keg is here sold for $1. Nothing costs less than two bits. The 'ladies' smoke cigarettes, for which you pay 25 cents for a pack of the meanest of the 5-cent brands.

"At the rear of the gallery is a bar. Colored waiters are in attendance up here. The 'ladies' do not serve the drinks. They only punch the bell for the waiter alter they have 'worked' you for the price. The stage performance is of an order so obscene as to shock and surprise even the New York Bowery rounders, and the orgies which take place in the gallery, in and out of the boxes, would be tolerated in no public place in the civilized world outside of San Francisco. Barbary Coast is mild when compared to the Cremorne, and even Chinatown can boast of no such wild, open iniquities. Boys are here, gamblers, cutthroats, blacklegs and thieves, but mostly the human jackals who live on the earnings of the 'lady' workers and waiters. Now and again you see a young face among the latter. Girls who have just started on the downward road are often to be found in the galleries of the Cremorne. What a fearful plunge toward hell they have already taken! And there is no hope for them. And the pity of it is more than words will tell.

"Sometimes, too, one sees that the 'lady' waiter's hands are hard and bony. These hands tell a mournful tale. They speak of good intentions, hard toil, of a striving and a trying and an ending in— damnation. At 11 o'clock the orgies of the Cremorne are at flood tide. There is a horrible din, above which can be heard an occasional curse or vile epithet, though the weazened orchestra is completely drowned. Tobacco smoke and the fumes of bad liquor are so thick as to render the atmosphere opaque. The indecent 'jokes' of the stage performers are inaudible, but their actions and poses speak louder than words. The bar is doing a rushing business. Everybody is almost or entirely drunk. Satan is king and 500 men and women are being damned in body, mind and soul. Sometimes the number is greater; never less. And seven nights a week!

"Hallinan's Crime Hatchery operates under a theatrical liquor-dealer's license and pays $76 every three months into the public treasury. Just what the Cremorne costs the taxpayers of the city and State in the way of necessitating increased accommodations in the County Jail, Hospital, Poorhouse, City Prison, Insane Asylum and other public institutions has never been computed to a nicety, but a liberal estimate places the cost at about 500 per cent greater than the license fee. Under the provisions of the law regulating these licenses the Cremorne must be closed by one hour after midnight. That is, its music and stage performance must be stopped. That there should be a limit to the inflictions of its loud-mouthed, weazened orchestra is a consideration devoutly to be thankful for by the adjacent neighborhood. 

 

"But not until the wee small hours of the morning; till, indeed, every victim's last cent has passed into the possession of Jack Hallinan and his pal, Ed Homan, and their accomplices in crime; till the bottom dregs of a night's fearful revelry have been drunk, are the orgies of the Cremorne abated for the nonce. In the 'cafe' at the end of the long galleries, for hours alter midnight, the short skirted harpies prey upon all who come into their clutches. Those without money are told to go when the show is over, but for those who have money the show is never over. Four burly, bully-ragging negroes furnish the entertainment here, and at all hours after midnight their voices may be heard out on the dark, deserted streets, screeching vile songs and indecent ditties. The whole performance, off and on the Cremorne's stage, from the time its foul doors open till they close, is one protracted robbery, interspersed with petty larcenies and lesser and greater crimes. 

 

"The stage performance is disgustingly obscene; the lauguage of the performers foul and unclean beyond the comprehension of those only moderately wicked. The performance is stretched out of all semblance, so as to keep the victims there till their last coin is gone. 'Don't you want a drink?' 'Won't you buy something?' 'Let me have a beer with you?' This is the grand chorus of the brazen hussies pleading into your ears 50 times in five minutes. The performance is so very vile and indecent that the sober ones would all probably leave after the first half of it were it not for the deep deception of the programme. 'Wait and see the terrible Turk buying and selling girls' it says. Then again: 'Wait and see the Turkish slave market scene.' Further down there is a catch-line calculated to stay the most dissatisfied: 'We are getting mighty close to the Pasha's paradise.' But it is all the meanest kind of a delusion and snare. The uninitiated expects to see nude women, or something of that sort, and waits on through the tiresomely vile performance for the grand finale. And his only reward for the waiting and endurance is a plethoric redundancy of the vilest language imaginable to the most depraved men and women. 

 

"The actions are only suggestive, and vilely and indecently so at that. When the spectator leaves the Cremorne he feels that he has been robbed. He is much poorer in purse, and has lost whatever remnant of self-respect he may have had when he entered the dive. Hallinan's Crime Hatchery runs seven nights in the week, and the orgies of the seventh night are, if anything, wilder and viler than those of the other six. Boys frequent the Cremorne. Not your boys, pray heaven, but somebody's boys. You find them mostly in the filthy little private boxes, almost sometimes quite— hidden from view of the main audience by double folds of foul, almost slimy lace curtains, which are so very ragged and so very unclean as to leave a bad odor in the air and soil clean hands that touch them. Boys who frequent this place go down very rapidly. The criminal records prove it abundantly.

"Only boys of well-to-do parents are encouraged in patronizing the Cremorne. Those who can afford to buy bad wine at $5 a bottle are welcomed most heartily. And a dirty, greasy negro waiter stands around waiting to sneak away the bottle after the first glass or two have been emptied. Not to save the vile stuff, for it is worthless. Oh, no; the half filled and nearly filled wine bottles are not filched from the boxes because the 'wine'— called only by courtesy— is valuable, but rather that another bottle may be ordered at once.

"A police official who investigated Hallinan's Crime Hatchery recently very thoroughly, tells how the 'actresses,' dressed most indecently and immodestly, proceed to rob their victims. In the box In which he sat— disguised as a 'sport'— a flashy young man with more money and less brains was shown in by the colored waiter. A moment later one of the 'actresses,' with low-necked, short-sleeved bodice and very, scant skirts, came tripping in and at once set about to 'work' the 'sucker.'  'I'm awful dry.' she began at once, after the initial 'How are you to-night?' had been passed between them. Then without further ado the punched the button. Immediately the door slid back and the waiter appeared. 'We want something to drink,' said the harpie. 'What shall it it be?' to the 'sucker.'  'I don't like beer; let's have wine, eh?'  'Wine,' feebly responded the victim. He was a little surprised to find he had to pay $5 for a bottle of cheap claret that had not even the virtue of being corked nor labeled, but by this time the unblushing siren who had edged very near him had her arm about him. He paid it ungrumblingly. Two small glasses were filled from the bottle and the bottle sat in a corner on the floor.

"Presently the 'actress' became thirsty again. They looked for the bottle and found it gone. 'Why, we must have drunk it all,' she said, and another bottle was ordered and paid for. This was repeated till the victim had spent $30, which was all he had. He was pretty full by this time, and being 'broke' the woman at once deserted him. He went to sleep on the floor. In the morning he awoke to find his watch and ring in the possession of Hallinan and a wine bill for $40 against him at the bar. Before he could recover his jewelry he had to satisfy this bill. Twenty of these cases happen nightly, and seven nights a week."

"THERE ARE MANY SUCH. Dives That are Moral Stenches to the Community... There are many dives in San Francisco— many more than in any other city of its size. We may be lacking in many things, but not in dives. Our gilded youth are well provided for in this respect, and the pitfalls for our own sons and daughters are numerous and varied. No; we are not backward in iniquity...The main feature of all the dives are the female waiters. They are mostly aged, all are brazen and but few even passingly good looking. Yet they serve their purpose. They make the dive-keeper rich." 

Thanks, Art!  While the Cremorne got much of the space, the article also discussed the Palace Variety Theatre on Post, the Bella Union at Kearny and Washington, the Star on Grant near Sutter, the Olympic at Grant and Morton (now Maiden Lane), and the Elite on Grant at Geary.

Sometime around 1893 it was rebranded as a burlesque house called the Midway Plaisance. Scott MacLeod comments: 

"I did a search and found that the 'Midway Plaisance' had its origins at the 1893 Columbia Exposition in Chicago. The S.F. version is mentioned in the Call as late as 1897 and was a bawdy striptease house featuring Asian women. My guess is that it probably changed to the Midway Theatre around the turn of the century." 

Art Siegel adds that "Midway Plaisance" was used in 1894 at the San Francisco Midwinter Fair to describe the roadway with entertainment attractions. He notes that there's a photo by I.W. Taber in the Open SF History Project collection and that Wikipedia has an article on the term "Midway."

 

 

An 1895 Illustrated Directory Company drawing by E.S. Glover from the David Rumsey Map Collection. That's 4th St. on the right. Thanks to Woody LaBounty for locating the drawing. He shares some San Francisco history every Wednesday. Sign up at sanfranciscostory.com.

A closer look at the Midway from the E.S. Glover drawing. Click on either of these for larger views.

The building was to be demolished in 1897 but the building owner, John W. Makay, granted the Midway Plasiance operator, Ned Homan, a new three year lease. Thanks to Scott MacLeod for finding an article about this in the April 15, 1897 San Francisco Call. It's on the website of the California Digital Newspaper Collection. The article called the venue a "Noted Palace of Sin" and noted that "the living pictures and Oriental dancers will continue to lure the rural visitor."

This photo by George A. McDonald, from a scrapbook of Hamilton Henry Dobbin, is dated 1898 by the California State Library. The Midway Plasiance is the building on the extreme right. We're looking east. The three story light-colored building just this side of Sanborn, Vail & Co. was the Cineograph. Down the street the Call Building is still under construction.

Looking east on Market between 3rd & 4th in a c.1898 image from a stereo slide in the Scott MacLeod collection. It was a post on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page. The Midway Plaisance is the light colored building in third from the right. Signage on the front also says "Home of Burlesque." On the side we get "Oriental...", "Big Show Ev..." and "Admiss..." The Cineograph building, here seen with an added fancy dome, is just this side of the Sanborn Vail & Co. building.

 

 

The full slide the image above came from. It was a post by Scott MacLeod on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page that also included a dozen other early slides of San Francisco. Also see his post of enlargements from those slides.  

 

A c.1898 image of the Midway Plaisance. Thanks to Laurel Sweeney for locating this one. It was shared in a post on the San Francisco Remembered Facebook page and then vanished from that page. 

Sometime around 1900 the venue was renamed the Midway Theatre.

A Grand Jury inspection of the conditions at the Midway resulted in an arrest warrant being issued for its proprietor. This article appeared in the January 27, 1905 issue of the San Francisco Examiner:

 

Thanks to Art Siegel for locating the article. 

A 1905 image from a stereo card by International View Co. appearing on the Open SF History Project site. The Midway Theatre is the second building in from the right. The Cineograph is a bit lost down the block.

A March 23, 1905 image by T.E. Heght from the San Francisco Public Library collection. We're looking west with the domed building of the Cineograph halfway down the block, after the Sanborn, Vail & Co. building. The Midway is the lighter building way down the block.

Thanks to Jack Tillmany for this detail from the 1905 photo. That second building in from the left is the Cineograph. The Midway Theatre, "Home of Burlesque" is the lighter building farther down the block. The image appears on the Cinema Tour page for the Cineograph.

 

Another 1905 view by T.E. Hecht, this one giving us a view a bit farther to the east. It's been hand tinted by Bennett Hall, who has kindly shared it on Flickr. 

 

Closing: The 1906 earthquake and fire finished the Midway Theatre. It was still listed in the 1905 city directory.

 

A view east toward the Call Building taken by Stewart and Rogers on April 18, 1906. Thanks to Jack Tillmany for locating the image in the Open SF History Project collection.

More information: There was also a Midway Theatre on Pacific Ave., opening post-earthquake. It was another place of dubious virtue. 

Jack Tillmany's Arcadia Publishing book "Theatres of San Francisco" can be previewed on Google Books. It's available from Amazon or your local bookseller.

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