Kate Shaffmaster, director of plays at Allens Lane

Kate Shaffmaster, 92, who directed plays in Philadelphia for more than 40 years, died Wednesday, Feb. 9, at home in Mount Airy.

Mrs. Shaffmaster first appeared onstage at age 8 in a church production in West Virginia. "Thereafter she was sure what she wanted to do with her life," said a daughter, Lisa.

By the time Mrs. Shaffmaster and her husband, Frederic, moved to Mount Airy in 1951, both were experienced thespians, having performed in community theater and radio drama and having produced operas including The Marriage of Figaro while living in Cincinnati.

In 1953, the couple and an interracial group of neighbors organized the Allens Lane Arts Center. According to the center's website, the founders were concerned about community tensions in Mount Airy and felt that increasing access to the arts would bring people together as well as develop talent.

Mrs. Shaffmaster began directing plays at the center. She always viewed theater as a catalyst for social change, her daughter said. Her productions of Cry, the Beloved Country and A Raisin in the Sun in the early 1960s reflected the struggle for civil rights and offered opportunities for local actors in a changing community.

For 15 years, plays were staged in the center's auditorium.

Then, in 1968, Mrs. Shaffmaster established the Cafe Theater of Allens Lane. Patrons sat at candlelit tables and were encouraged to bring food and wine. An open discussion with the cast and director followed the play.

Mrs. Shaffmaster directed four or five productions a year. Casts included actors with visions of Broadway and moonlighting computer programmers and homemakers.

She told The Inquirer in 1986 that she objected to the word hobby as a description of the amateurs' theatrical work.

"It is so much more than that because of the sacrifice these people make to practice their art," she said. "It is a way of life, because there really isn't much time for anything else when you are doing shows. The theater becomes your family."

Members of Mrs. Shaffmaster's own family - her husband, two sons, and two daughters - were part of her theater, acting, collecting tickets, building sets. In 1978, Lisa Shaffmaster was a principal in the Cafe Theater's production of Eugene O'Neill's All God's Chillun Got Wings, the story of a racially mixed marriage.

Mrs. Shaffmaster also directed plays at other venues, including Rap Master Ronnie, a satiric musical about Ronald Reagan, at the On Stage Theater in Center City in 1987.