Ona Bryant Talbot

(May, 1865-Jan. 17, 1955). Talbot was born in Richview, Illinois, while her family was en route from Iowa to Indianapolis. She graduated from Shortridge High School, married Richard L. Talbot, and became involved in early attempts to organize music festivals.

When Carl Schneider founded the original Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra in 1905, Talbot served as recording secretary on the board of directors for the few seasons the orchestra survived. As early as 1901, she had begun organizing her own concerts, bringing other orchestras to the city with the financial backing of local businessmen.

In 1903, Talbot engaged Mme. Ernestine Schumann-Heink, an operatic contralto at the height of her career, to sing in the assembly room of the new Claypool Hotel. She guaranteed the singer’s agent $600 and began selling tickets. While the Ona B. Talbot Fine Arts Association may have wavered off-and-on financially over the next 25 years (even to the point of bankruptcy in 1913), Talbot found massive success as she presented internationally known artists to Indianapolis audiences.

She directed musical programs at the White House during the Woodrow Wilson administration and, in 1914, made local music history when she filled the Murat Theatre (see Old National Centre) with the largest audience ever assembled in the city for a subscription concert. Mme. Schumann-Heink was again the artist. Talbot died in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania; she is buried in Crown Hill Cemetery, Indianapolis.

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