How did Broadway get started?
What we think of today as Broadway didn’t really get its start until a few entrepreneurs decided to move theaters away from the downtown area the Wall Street area where people usually congregated and instead the Mallorys’ were the first ones to build the Madison Square Theater and that was in 1882. That was on 29th street I believe and nobody thought it would be successful because it was so far out from town. But then The Casino Theater was built shortly and it was a huge success and that just brought in the Abby Theater followed suit, the Empire Theater and pretty soon you had a section of town that featured the best in live entertainment and that just drew the towns’ people out. It really changed the entire city actually of Manhattan.
