The Big Game, North Beach and The San Francisco Opera

The earliest seeds of the San Francisco Opera Company were planted in two places: the City's North Beach neighborhood and in Palo Alto at the "Big Game" between Stanford and California on November 19, 1921 – the inaugural football match at the newly constructed Stanford Stadium.

Several sources state that Gaetano Merola first visited San Francisco before the earthquake in 1906 as the accompanist for Signora Eugenia Mantelli. The 1906 date given seems unlikely since Signora Mantelli gave her final recitals in San Francisco in June 1903. Merola's presence cannot be verified since no pianist is credited in the advertisements for these performances.  

He later returned as a conductor with the International Grand Opera Company while on tour in San Francisco during the summer of 1909.  He made a strong impression in his presentation of Mascagni's L'Amico Fritz; the Chronicle noted that "Merola, made the evening not only the most memorable of the present season, but also eloquently expressed the fact that the composer's lyric work has met with unmistakable favor." It was with this troupe that Merola began his long collaboration with stage director Armando Agnini.

 

Merola as one of the touring conductors with the San Carlo Opera during their annual visits to San Francisco between 1918 and 1921. In the summer of 1921 he decided to remain behind in San Francisco. According to Arthur Bloomfield he earned a living giving lessons. He also began making friends in social circles to further his aim of creating an opera company for the City.

"Opera Stars Raise Their Voices to the Open Sky" shows photographs of opera stars Bianca Saroya and Giovanni Martelli, image source: San Francisco Chronicle June 4, 1922

One of his new opera-loving acquaintances, lawyer Horace Clifton, invited Merola to Palo Alto to experience a college football match. But, as Bloomfield put it, the conductor had "tenors more on his mind than quarterbacks." Clifton's wife, Olga, recalled many years later:

My husband and I took Maestro and his wife, Rosa, to the Big Game in November of 1921," she recalled. "While we were in the grandstand the Stanford Band came out. 'My God,' Merola said, 'I've never heard such acoustics in an open air stadium. This is magnificent I've got to give opera here!

Contemporaneously, the San Francisco Examiner's music critic Redfern Mason remarked: "The artist in him was impressed by the great spectacle. It made him think of the games in the ancient Roman amphitheaters." Merola was also impressed with acoustics. Very aware of the San Francisco fog, Merola also remarked "The nights are wonderful... There is no mist to chill you to the bone. It is as delightful as a night in Naples."

Merola turned to his friends in Italian-American community for support in his venture. A later account in Etude magazine described:

The tall, wiry, gentle-mannered young Italian spoke English very well, but always with the mellifluous accent that is heard in the laughter around the Bay of Naples. This stood him in good stead, because it was to his countrymen he went first with his plan to present a season of outdoor opera, to members of the San Francisco Fisherman's Association with whom he played cards of an evening and ate pizza. These were they who gave him the first $10,000, and on the strength of which he managed to borrow $13,000 more from a bank.

Redfern Mason gave the lion's share of the credit for the stage of Merola's extravaganza at Stanford Stadium to the conductor and to the generosity of his Italian-American friends.

source: San Francisco Examiner June 22, 1922

They have set an example to San Franciscans generally which, if followed up, will make California what by genius and temperament it seems intended to be--the Hellas of the Western world.

So I will set down the names of these gentlemen in enduring type that folks may know to whom they owe a debt of gratitude. They are Gaetano Merola, A. Farina, G. Torchia, G. Napolitano, A. Napolitano, G. Milani, V. Frevola, A. Paoni, G. Brucia and G. Stradi.

Antonio Farina, manager of the Crab and Salmon Fisherman's Association, hosted the card games where Merola and company hatched the idea. Guglielmo Torchia, also known as William Torchia, ran the Agenzia Torchia and was railroad and shipping agent. He was also the publisher of newspapers like Era Democratica and L'Italia. He also organized the Federation of Italian Societies.

Giuseppe Brucia (who sometimes went by Joseph Brucia), who was an olive grower and purveyor of dried fruit, secured the loan from Amadeo Giannini and the Bank of Italy.  Giulio Stradi was successful in the produce business.  At the age of 16, Stradi's daughter Louise became Merola's secretary.

The 1922 City Directory shows that brothers Alfonso and Amedeo Napolitano worked as a foreman and a clerk respectively (the initial G. Napolitano must have been a mistake?). Redfern Mason's list includes an A. Paoni, but later account list three men with that surname - Amedeo, Amalio and Anacleto Paoni appear to have been cousins (Amelio is usually listed with the surname Paone). They variously worked a produce clerk and machinist, grocer, and fitter.

Mason lists a G. Milani among Merola's benefactors (there was a clerk named Guido Milano living in North Beach at that time). However, later accounts give the name of Milano Milani who appears as actor in the Italian language press of the 1910s. Later City Directories show him working as a bookkeeper and clerk. V. Frevola is actually James V. Frevola who also worked as a bookkeeper.

Opera at Stanford Stadium was a tremendous success -- artistically.  It, however, was a failure financially.  Merola's friends were never paid back. Merola had to work off the remaining debt by conducting in Mexico City for a spell.

The San Francisco Opera formally acknowledged the contribution of Merola's Italian-American friends with a plaque dedicated in 2003. Although they were not among the 45 sponsors for the San Francisco Opera's inaugural season, Gaetano Merola could not have stage his Stanford Stadium success and garnered wider community support.

Bibliography

"Appointed General Agent for Cunard and Anchor Lines," Weekly Commercial News August 7, 1920

Bishop, Cardell, The San Carlo Opera Company, 1913-1955: Grand Opera for Profit. (Bishop, CA, 1978).

Bloomfield, Arthur, The San Francisco Opera, 1922-1978 (Comstock Editions, 1978).

"Cook, John Douglas, "'Mr. Opera' Takes a Curtain," Etude May 1954.

"Cook, John Douglas, "Twenty Five Years of Opera," Opera and Concert September 1947.

Crocker-Langley San Francisco City Directory (H. S. Crocker Co. 1922).

Fichera, Sebastian, Italy on The Pacific: San Francisco's Italian Americans. (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011).

"G. Brucia, 90, Olive Grower," San Francisco Examiner April 16, 1974.

Hunt, Grace Rollins, "George Hamlin Will Sing Here," San Francisco Chronicle November 28, 1909.

Jones, Idwal, "Out With The Fishers," San Francisco Examiner January 8, 1925

"Many Curtain Calls Demanded," San Francisco Chronicle July 7, 1909.

Mason, Redfern, "Al Fresco Opera at Palo Alto Will Be Done On Magnificent Scale. Great Artists to Sing," San Francisco Examiner May 21, 1922.

Mason, Redfern, "Stanford Opera Is An Ideal Expression of Latin Culture," San Francisco Examiner June 18, 1922

Rando, Maria Gloria, "The Italian Connection With The San Francisco Opera House," L'Italo Americano October 12, 2021. [webpage].

"S.F. Opera Honors Founders in Program," San Francisco Chronicle February 26, 2003.

Venturini, Donald Joseph, "La Vittoria del'Opera nel San Francisco," San Francisco Quarterly Winter-Spring 1951-1952.

Wiegand, David, "S.F. Opera honors founders in program Merola, other 'angels' on new plaque." San Francisco Chronicle 26 Feb. 2003