A royal Bengal tiger is shot by a policeman after leaping from a top story window
of the burning American Museum.
Barnum’s American Museum, at the corner of Spring Street and Broadway, burned on the night of March 2, 1868. It was a freezing cold night and the building was coated with ice from the firemen’s hoses. The double image above was made for use with a stereo-opticon viewer, a popular entertainment of the nineteenth century. The viewer looked through a frame at the dual, almost identical images and perceived a three-D effect.
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Barnum’s on fire the night on 2 March 1868, from Harper’s Illustrated. |
 Barnum’s before the fire. |
For more on Barnum and arson, see the Barnum’s Hippodrome page on this site or visit The Lost Museum website.
