Usually, these melodramas were interspersed with orchestral music and songs complementing the performance. Sometimes a meal was served up during the evening.

The performance's compere would usually hold up hand signs telling the audience how they should participate: sigh, clap, boo, cheer and so on.

Mr Kenna was always keen to be part of charitable entertainment. One evening took place in March 1890 when a large audience attended for some minstrel entertainment given in the School of Arts.

This entertainment was in aid of the Guild Band.

A really good company had been assembled consisting of an orchestra, under the leadership of Mr W.G. Smith, and a circle of nine vocalists.

Mr R. Kenna was one of the vocalists and he sang The Sailor's Life.

The entertainment was brought to a close by a side-splitting romance melodrama entitled Rumuns from Rome.

Richard Phillip Kenna was the son of an Irishman who emigrated to the Southern Colonies and became a prosperous pub owner in Bathurst.

Young Richard wanted to be a doctor, but this was foiled in 1886 when his father's trustee, Anthony Fowler, sued him for slander. Richard Kenna Snr had died in 1879.

The judge ordered that Richard Jnr should also pay some £480 in costs, which sent him bankrupt.

Young Richard decided he would quietly leave Australia and intended to join other troops heading to the Sudan War in Egypt, as a dresser with the New South Wales Contingent.

He anticipated that the military job could help with his medical career.

Anthony Fowler got word of this and Mr Kenna was arrested, which caused him to miss the troop ship.

With no money, he turned to his second love, the theatre and show business.

He later travelled by train to do shows in Melbourne and some tours overseas before returning to Bathurst.

Seeing a need for entertainment, he established several troupes of performers which he trained before obtaining bookings in other regional towns.

Most seasons lasted three to four months. His names for the groups included Kenna's Empire Minstrels and The Zulima Company, which was a variety troupe.

In mid-April 1901, Kenna's Empire Minstrels opened their season in the School of Arts before a large audience.

The reporter from the Bathurst Free Press And Mining Journal noted that the company was essentially vaudeville, and the diversified and hilarious character of the program was much appreciated.

The various members of the troupe were well-received, encores being frequent.

The program, which was a lengthy one, was opened by the entire company singing the chorus Garden Stuff.

Gertie Mason very nicely rendered the serious comic song Jane Shaw and Out On The Deep was then given by Henry Davis, the possessor of a good bass voice.

Another song, Get Your Honey's Worth, was humorously sung by Jack Williams.

The reporter said that perhaps the most interesting feature of the varied entertainment was the marvellously trained animals - dogs, monkeys, baboons, birds and cats - introduced by Professor Godfrey.

The remarkable feats through which these animals go must be witnessed to be fully realised, the reporter said.

Eventually, Mr Kenna followed in his father's footsteps and went into hotels on a full-time basis when he took over the operations of the family-owned Grand Hotel during 1902.

He was also associated with several other local hotels.

He did get married (to Louie), but had no children, as did his three siblings, who passed away without any children to inherit the family's estate.