1874. Clara Louise Kellogg made her American operatic debut under
Maurice Grau, in New York City. (She had appeared as _Gilda_ in
"Rigoletto" at the Academy of Music in 1861 (Feb. 27), before
going to Europe, and had concertized in the United States for
four years, 1868-1872.)

1874. The Cecilia Society of Boston organized with B. J. Lang as
conductor.

CHAPTER VI

1875-1890

The period of fifteen years from 1875 to 1890 was most certainly a
period of progress. Not only was the country growing rapidly in
population and wealth, but means of communication were much greater and
more efficient than in the preceding years. The present writer well
remembers a journey from San Francisco to St. Louis, and on to Boston in
1878, when there was one single track railroad between Oakland and
Omaha. Cheyenne consisted of two rows of primitive looking wooden
houses, behind which were "anchored" many emigrants' wagons, or "prairie
schooners" as they were called. Only a few years later (in the early
eighties) Colonel Mapleson visited Cheyenne with his opera company,
which included Patti and Gerster, and wrote thus of the place: "Although
Cheyenne is but a little town, consisting of about two streets, it
possesses a most refined society, composed, it is true, of cow-boys; yet
one might have imagined oneself at the London Opera when the curtain
rose,--the ladies in brilliant toilettes and covered with diamonds; the
gentlemen all in evening dress. The entire little town is lighted by
electricity. The club-house is one of the pleasantest I have ever
visited, and the people are most hospitable."

This account reminds the writer of a visit, not so many years ago, to
Oklahoma City where the ladies resembled those of Cheyenne. There was,
however, but one gentleman, within the writer's range of vision, in
evening dress. And when Mapleson visited Cheyenne Oklahoma was an Indian
reservation. Thus has civilization advanced.

In 1875 San Francisco was already a good-sized city, but almost the
whole country between San Francisco and Chicago and St. Louis has been
developed since 1875.

In San Francisco we find the establishment of the "Loring Club" in 1877.
But good music was getting its roots in deeper in the East. In New York
the "Symphony Society" was founded by Dr. Leopold Damrosch in 1878, and
was followed in 1881 by the "Boston Symphony Orchestra," which was
established through the liberality of Major H