Now we arrive at another important event in our theatre's history, the first engagement of John McCullough. For several years Lawrence Barrett and John McCullough had been the lessees and managers of the old California Theatre in San Francisco, and in spite of Barrett's known sagacity as a manager and notwithstanding the succession of brilliant stars presented at the California and the magnificent stock company kept to support them, the venture was not a financial success, and Barrett and McCullough were forced to succumb. Then it was that McCullough began his career as a star; what reputation he had made up to this time was as Edwin Forrest's leading man. "Larry" Barrett had "starred" some in the character of Elliott Gray in "Rosedale," now they were both out of a job and looking for engagement. Barrett went East and resumed his starring in "Rosedale" and gradually drifted into the Shakespearian roles. McCullough went to Virginia City, Nevada, with a picked-up company, and played his first star engagement. They took to the "genial" John very kindly there, and worked him him up a rousing big benefit; those were the palmy days of the Comstock and everybody had money, actors were at a premium in the camp and the old theatre was packed at every performance. The "Benefit" netted McCullough over two thousand dollars and "John" was glad he was an actor. He knew we had a fine theatre and a good company in Salt Lake, so he made arrangements to come and play with us a spell. On November the 26th, he opened in "Damon" and followed it in quick succession (playing nightly) with "Richelieu," "Hamlet," "Othello," "Shylock," Volage in "Marble Heart," "Richard III," "Robbers," "Macbeth," "Brutus," "Romeo and Juliet," etc., etc. This was a very notable engagement, in more ways than one. It was notable for its length, covering a stretch of twenty-three nights; likewise for its strength, as George B. Waldron and Madam Scheller, who had both returned from a Montana tour, were added to the company to stiffen the cast--here we had really three stars and a strong, capable, self-sustaining stock company in the cast of all the plays during McCullough's first Salt Lake engagement, which lasted three weeks, terminating on September 17th. Again the stock company was left to its own strength and resources and even after this brilliant trio of dramatic artists, McCullough, Scheller and Waldron dropped away from us, the managers, with never-failing confidence and temerity, put forward the stock once more to plough through the billowy Christmas time, past the new year and on to February 10th, when we welcomed another acquisition to the ranks in the person of Miss Annie Lockhart.