Thanks, George and Bill, for the scoop on Salmi Morse. Since my request, my partner purchased a wonderful book, The Great Victorian Sacrilege - Preachers, Politics and The Passion, 1879-1884, by Alan Nielsen, which deals with Salmi Morse's Passion play. It is both a scholarly study and a ripping good read. For anyone interested in this truly bizarre character or interested in early San Francisco theater, I highly recommend this book. Subsequently, I have read some wild articles in the Argonaut and the SF Alta and Chronicle, as well as a 5-part bio of Salmi Moss that appeared in the Santa Cruz Riptide in 1950, as well as coverage in the NY Times of Morse's attempts to mount the play there. What few know about the man is that he was in San Francisco in 1848 and returned there several times before settling in the mid 1870s. In fact, when he claimed to be roaming the Holy Land gaining inspiration for his Passion play, he was actually at a ranch in Mendocino that was held by his wife and brother-in-law since the 1860s. When he claimed to be a hero in the Crimean War, he was actually in Constantinople working at a shop for his father-in-law. This guy could spin tales as wild as Emperor Norton. You probably wonder why all the interest in Salmi Morse. This is all peripheral research for the first rewrite of new book on the first successful American passion play (and America's first blockbuster) - Ben Hur. Again, thanks for all the help. Su