Mrs. Henry Wood’s East Lynne, or The Elopement was the most popular melodrama of the decade. Sam hated it thought it was cheap and manipulative overly sentimental and simplistic. One night, the boys in Johnny Burn’s Branch of the Maguire Theatre’s store front bar took the prop handcuffs from East Lynne and got them on the wrists of a local bartender and then everybody ran around town desperately looking for the stage manager or a member of the theatre troupe. They got him out shortly before curtain and the bartender treated his bar who had helped look to drinks. — The popular thing to do was to dress up and ride to social functions – in the summer, East Lynne was the event the ladies drove in Saddle Horses and Buggy Teams to attend. A Fashion stable opened across the street. — July 14, 1863 —