across from City Hall were appropriated for the construction, and a bond issue was approved by the voters in 1927. By October 1931, when the twin cornerstones were laid, the stock market crash and ensuing Depression had significantly reduced the construction costs, and the two buildings were completed within the year for US$5.5 million. The War Memorial Opera House opened on October 15, 1932 with an inaugural production of Tosca starring Claudia Muzio and Dino Borgioli (a primitive recording of Act 1 has survived, and is included in the Romophone Muzio series), followed a few days later by a charming 27-year-old Lily Pons in Lucia di Lammermoor. With a new house, Merola's company grew rapidly in its first decade, producing its first Richard Wagner Ring Cycle in 1935 starring Kirsten Flagstad (in her first complete Ring anywhere) and Lauritz Melchior, and introducing conductors Fritz Reiner in 1936 and Erich Leinsdorf in 1938. Part of Merola's southern strategy was to augment his company's home season with run-out performances at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles. He had been a partner in the formation of Los Angeles Grand Opera, which had a successful run from 1924 to 1931. With the opening of the War Memorial in October 1932, Merola entered into a business agreement with the Los Angeles arts impresario L.E. Behymer to present stars of the San Francisco Opera in an abbreviated season of locally produced operas. So it was that L.A. audiences heard Muzio and Bonelli in La traviata and Il trovatore and Pons in Lucia and Rigoletto just days before their War Memorial debuts. Other notable productions included The Bartered Bride with Elisabeth Rethberg and an immense Le Coq d'Or in 1934. In 1937, Merola shed all pretense of a Los Angeles company and formally established a long-running series of annual visits by the San Francisco Opera Association to the Shrine Auditorium. That first season included Lauritz Melchior and Kirsten Flagstad in Tristan und Isolde conducted by Fritz Reiner, Melchior in Lohengrin, Pons and Ezio Pinza in Lakmé, Gina Cigna and Giovanni Martinelli in Aida and Maria Jeritza in Tosca. The result was an unbroken string of yearly Los Angeles performances through 1965. Later years In 1943, Merola brought Kurt Herbert Adler to San Francisco to serve initially as chorus master; in time, he would take on additional duties as conductor, choral director and chief deputy. Adler had been