Built at 100 Main Street in Ansonia in 1869-1870, the Ansonia Opera House served as the Lower Naugatuck Valley's premier theater and public hall until the Sterling Opera House was built in Derby in 1889. The Ansonia Opera House’s hall is on the third floor of the building, while stores are located on the first floor. Until 1910, the hall was run by a corporation called the Ansonia Hall Company, in which Jeremiah Bartholomew and his descendants held a controlling interest. Connecticut’s oldest opera house, for sixty years it was the center of Ansonia’s civic and social activity and entertainment, including graduations, dances, recitals, basketball games, and boxing matches. Sometime after 1896, additional windows were added to the building‘s second floor. In 1971, the state fire marshal’s office closed the hall to public assemblies. It was later rented out as a gym and then as storage space and is currently in need of restoration.
the Ansonia opera house will soon see crowds again in the near future as restoration efforts have begun this year (2022).
