The Brooklyn Theatre fire was a catastrophic theatre fire that broke out on the evening of December 5, 1876, in the city of Brooklyn (now a borough of New York City). The fire took place at the Brooklyn Theatre, near the corner of Washington and Johnson streets, with over 1,000 guests attending. The conflagration killed at least 278 individuals, with some accounts reporting more than 300 dead. 103 unidentified victims were interred in a common grave at Green-Wood Cemetery, marked by an obelisk, while more than two dozen identified victims were interred individually in separate sections at the Cemetery of the Evergreens in Brooklyn.
The Brooklyn Theatre fire ranks third in fatalities among fires occurring in theatres and other public assembly buildings in the United States, behind the 1942 Cocoanut Grove fire and the 1903 Iroquois Theatre fire.
Fatalities mainly arose in the family circle, the highest tier in the theatre offering the cheapest seats. This gallery sustained extreme temperatures and dense, suffocating smoke early in the conflagration. Only one stairway served it which became jammed with people and cut off escape for more than half the gallery's occupants.
Brooklyn Theatre
The Brooklyn Theatre opened on October 2, 1871 and stood near the southeast corner of Washington and Johnson streets one block north of Brooklyn's City Hall. It was owned by The Brooklyn Building Association, a partnership of affluent Brooklyn residents including Abner C. Keeney, William Kingsley, and Judge Alexander McCue. After its destruction, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle called it Brooklyn's "principal theatre." The theatre had been managed by Sara and Frederick B. Conway until the last 20 months of its existence; the Conways were long involved in New York and Brooklyn theatre, having managed Brooklyn's Park Theatre from 1864 to 1871. Sara Conway died in April 1875, about six months after her husband. Their children Minnie, Lillian, and Frederick Jr. then managed the theatre for a short time, but without success. Albert Marshman Palmer and Sheridan Shook were the manager and proprietor of New York's Union Square Theatre, and they assumed a new lease on the Brooklyn Theatre later in 1875, managing it until the catastrophe took place.
The Brooklyn Theatre stood a block from Fulton Street, the main thoroughfare to the Manhattan ferries and readily accessible to both New York and Brooklyn residents. Its seating capacity was about 1,600. Both Conway and Shook & Palmer sought upscale productions with well-known actors and actresses. The Brooklyn Theatre became a well-respected house in Brooklyn's nascent theatre district, which included the smaller and older Park, Olympic, and Globe theatres.
The Two Orphans
Shook and Palmer were already enjoying success with their Union Square Theatre Company in New York and went on to transplant a number of their productions to the Brooklyn house. Their specialty was the adaptation of French plays to the American stage. The Two Orphans was a melodrama about two young homeless orphans separated by abduction; it featured Miss Kate Claxton and was presented on the night of the fire. It had been a particularly successful play, running for 180 performances in 1874 at the Union Square Theatre. It was originally Les Deux Orphelines by Adolphe d'Ennery and Eugène Cormon, and had been adapted to the American stage by N. Hart Jackson. Shook and Palmer brought it to the Brooklyn Theatre in March 1876 after an American tour, including one performance at the Brooklyn Theatre on April 12, 1875, two weeks before Sara Conway's death.
The 1876 run at the Brooklyn Theatre was well received but was ending. At the time of the fire, Palmer indicated that a number of Union Square Theatre productions had been scheduled for the Brooklyn Theatre and that all the scenes and properties for Ferrsol, Rose Michel, Conscience, and Colonel Sellers had been stored on the premises, along with the wardrobe for The Two Orphans and a suite of furniture for Rose Michel.
Building features
The Brooklyn Theatre was designed by Thomas R. Jackson and constructed in 1871 according to Sara Conway's specifications. Brooklyn Police Fire Marshal Patrick Keady gathered testimony and constructed a chronology of the disaster, and he said that the structure had better exits than many other public buildings in Brooklyn at that time.