“Mystery Play with Musical Setting.” Advertisement. August 11, [1914].

Outdoor theatricals were popular at Halcyon, many of them directed by Maurice Browne, the famed actor and director, who lived at the colony for several years.

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HALCYON
A group of Theosophists from Syracuse, New York, moved to Oceana, California, in 1903 to form the Halcyon community. They rejected the teachings of Katherine Tingley, the head of the movement at the time, in favor of a return to the original work of Madame Blavatsky. They built a sanatorium for the treatment of liquor, morphine, and opium addiction. Socialism and communal property marked the group and drew the attention of reformers like novelist Upton Sinclair.