Tuesday, March 05, 2002

Bill Libby, a founder of the Matchbox Children’s Theatre (MCT) has died at the age of 58 in Anchorage, Alaska due to complications following surgery.

Janet Anderson, another founder of MCT says she and Libby, who died Feb. 23, worked together at the Austin Park and Recreation Department and came up with the idea for the theater in 1975. "We both had theater backgrounds and we talked about starting a children’s theater company. Austin has had a long tradition of theater programs and we wanted to include a theater company to perform for children in that," she says.

The Park and Recreation Department agreed to fund the MCT and it held its first performance, "Sleeping Beauty or the Famous Rose Taboo," in the fall of 1975.