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Bordwell’s Opera House on Washington Street

by
Michael P. Laitinen

The latter half of 19th century in East Saginaw was a time fueled by liquor and debauchery. Standing front and center in the middle of it all was Bordwell's Opera House. The 1870s and 1880s were a golden age for the White Pine lumber industry in the Saginaw Valley, as thousands of loggers worked in the surrounding White Pine forests. Workers known as "shantyboys" cut down the trees and moved them to the rivers, for transportation to waiting sawmills which stretched along the Saginaw River. There they produced hundreds of millions of board feet of lumber each year. It was transported by freighter to waiting markets in Chicago, Cleveland, and New York.

The "shantyboys" who labored in the camps worked hard and played hard. Convalescence began by embarking by train for the lively entertainment centers of the Saginaws. Patrons began the festivities after de-training at the Potter Street Railroad Station. The town was especially suited for the hard-partying lumberjacks, and a man most suited to fill their needs was Warren Bordwell (1839-1897).

 

Mr. Bordwell was in the entertainment business. He came to Saginaw by way of Detroit. Warren leased Smith's Opera House ". . . and promises to keep it up in point of excellence during his stay here" ("Bordwell Leases"). This fact proved true in the beginning of Bordwell's management of the Opera House. According to the Saginaw Daily Courier, "Manager Bordwell is fulfilling his promise to give a first class variety entertainment at a low price of admission, and if the patronage so far attended is any indication of future support, things will go swimmingly through the year" ("Bordwell Leases").

The Saginaw Atlas 1897 shows the Opera House location on South Washington Street between Germania (Federal) and Williams (Janes) streets. A Saginaw News photograph shows the front face of the Opera House between the City Auditorium to the South and an undisclosed building to the North. My research for photographs had a breakthrough upon contacting Lorrie Lea, Saginaw News librarian. No photos were available of the Opera House or its address at 219 South Washington. Instead, I had to take a step back and take a more peripheral view of what I was looking for. I focused on another major building, the City Auditorium. Lorrie was able to track down a photograph on file. And standing right where it should be was the building of the former Opera House. The building was a 50' x 80' three-story complex. (See photo above.)

Bordwell's Opera House advertised in local newspapers. Opera House advertisements were usually near ads featuring the Academy of Music, located on the corner of Washington and Williams. Warren employed a variety of entertainment like the famous gymnasts Malcom & Hulmes, vocalist Miss Minnie Ross, song and dance team Kelly and Moore, burlesque performances and matinees every Saturday afternoon at 2:30; ads for these acts were featured in the Saginaw Daily Courier ("Bordwell Leases").

 

The Opera House had a sordid past as well. In addition to the lively entertainment acts, it was known as one of the better bordellos in town, ranking just below Bell Steven's high society establishment. "The girls took customers into two large Wine Rooms, where they dispensed ministrations in 10 to 12 smaller, private tasting rooms that lined the walls" (Powers 30). Warren also encouraged the freelance prostitutes to frequent his establishment with their dates, renting out spare rooms at a buck a trick. Mr. Bordwell also was a thief regularly shortchanging customers at the bar he tended. His bouncers only pay for maintaining order was rolling the drunks their boss ordered out of the bar (Powers 30).

According to Ed Miller, in 1888, the Opera House came under new management. John E. Alexander was brought in as a partner and the building operated under the name of the Wintergarden. The place became popular with boxing matches. Heavyweight champions John Sullivan, Jim Jefferies, and Bob Fitzimmons trained there, tuning up for championship bouts.

Warren Bordwell became entangled in legal trouble due to his Opera House. The Temperance movement more and more had an influence on Saginaw. This eventually resulted in the City passing a law in 1892 requiring a license to run a theatre or saloon. The law allowed City Council the discretion to award such a license to any establishment it chooses. The Opera House was not granted such a license. Before long, Warren was placed under arrest for operating a theatre without a license (Powers 33).

Warren retained James H. Davitt as attorney, and Judge Stempell presided over the case. Davitt argued unsuccessfully with City Attorney Gage to quash the proceedings. Davitt argued: "Discrimination is not possible in a body granting license or approving bonds. The Council had no right to grant a license to the Academy of Music and refuse one to his client. It is dangerous to permit one the power to ruin the business of another at caprice, and it is against the Constitution of the United States ("Bordwell Found Guilty"). City attorney Gage declared: "Mr. Bordwell was not deprived of his property because no one has the inherent right to run a saloon or theatre and the power to regulate such things has been placed in the common councils by a decision of the Supreme Court of the State." Gage quoted a Grand Rapids case enabling it to release a license under certain conditions. Gage cited the Supreme Court's decision that "no one has the
inalienable right to run a saloon as to pursue any other natural calling and that municipal bodies have the right to discriminate in the interests of law, order, and morality." Judge Stempell proceeded with the trial. Bordwell was found guilty and fined $100.00. Bordwell promptly appealed his case to the Circuit Court ("Bordwell Found Guilty").

 

Warren Bordwell passed away in December 1897. He died at the residence of William Bartlett. The cause of death appeared to be liver disease caused by heavy drinking. He made residence in Saginaw for about 20 years. Bordwell died at age 58, leaving behind a daughter, brother and sister. His estate was valued at a 1897 figure of $15,000 ("Passed the Portals").

The Opera House building served more practical functions in the 1900s. The Saginaw Muslim Underwear Co. and Coony & Smith furniture store operated there. In the early 1930s, it housed a miniature golf course and, after Prohibition, a beer garden. Some of it was used as plumbing supply storage (Miller).

The Saginaw City Auditorium was demolished to make way for a downtown parking lot. The building to the North was demolished and rebuilt into the present day Saginaw News building. I estimate the Opera House was torn down sometime in the seventies. I drove around the site as it looks now and realized the grassy lot between the parking lot and the Saginaw News was the exact perimeter of Bordwell's Opera House.

As times inevitably change, so must we. The end of the nineteenth century marked significant change in American culture. Women's rights were gaining in acceptance and accordingly women's issues as well. This was part in parcel with the Temperance movement to ban alcoholic beverages and bawdy establishments. Warren Bordwell and his opera house stood headlong in the way of this movement. His inability to gage the tide of history doomed him in his remaining years to litigation an, to some extent, persecution to the new forces aligning against him and his ilk. Warren was certainly a man of his time. His Opera House served the demands of the masses with the unspoken approval of authority and community. What Bordwell's Opera house represents is truth and history. Agree or disagree with the establishment format; it is indelibly etched in the local history of the Saginaw Valley.

Works Cited

  • "Bordwell Found Guilty." Saginaw Evening News 18 Dec. 1895: 6.
  • "Bordwell Leases Smith's Opera House." Saginaw Daily Courier 28 Mar. 1878: 2.
  • Miller, Ed. "Big Bender at Bordwell's." Saginaw News 18 Mar. 1973: n.p.
  • "Opera House." Saginaw News 21 Mar. 1948: 35.
  • "Passed the Portals." Saginaw Courier Herald 11 Mar. 1896: 6.
  • Powers, Tom. Michigan Rogues, Desperados & Cut-throats. Davison, MI: Friede Publications, 2002.
 
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