EEO.

667 Broadway in Manhattan sits just south of West 3rd Street on the exact dividing line between the Greenwich Village and NoHo neighborhoods.

It was here at the corner of Broadway and Bond Street that New York City's first theater,

the Winter Garden, opened its doors in 1850.

The Winter Garden Theater, as we know it today, has been in operation since 1911 in the

theater district some three and a half miles to the north, but in 1864, the original Winter Garden was the epicenter

of American Theater. Stiled after the great theaters of Europe, the biggest, the most respected

names in show business performed at the Winter Garden. It was at this location, 667 Broadway,

on November 25, 1864,

that an historic evening of American theater took place.

The reviews were nothing short of astounding.

The accolades seemed without end.

The most important critics of the day were all in agreement

that the performance of Shakespeare's Julius Caesar

a benefit to raise funds for a statue in Central Park was surely to be remembered.

It was a performance that all others were to be judged against for as long as actors dare tread the boards anywhere in the world.

The statue to be erected with the funds from the triumphant benefit show was of William Shakespeare himself.

While the cornerstone of that monument had already been laid earlier in 1864,

various events, including the Civil War itself would delay the creation

and placement of the statue until 1872.

Shakespeare's statue still stands proudly to this day in Central Park on the literary walk

at the south end of the Mall near 67th Street.

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