Franklin Museum

The small Franklin Theatre prospered until the Panic of 1837 scared off its fashionable audience, forcing the struggling theatre to change its policy to melodrama at reduced rates. It became the Little Drury, adding German-language and minstrel productions. Later, as the Franklin Museum, it presented "living statues"--really an excuse to view scantily clad models. In the 1840s, the outcry against shows of this type led to the Common Council closing any offending houses. The Franklin shuttered in 1854.