The New York Crystal Palace In Flames - October 5, 1858

American Numismatic Society - On October 5, 1858, the New York Crystal Palace burned to the ground in just forty minutes after a fire broke out in the northeast corner of the building just after five o'clock in the evening. The American Institute, a civic organization dedicated to "encouraging and promoting domestic industry," was holding its annual fair, and about two thousand visitors were in the building at the time. The New York Herald (October 6, 1858) reported that despite scenes of "indescribable confusion," remarkably no one was killed in the fast-moving blaze.



Although the enormous structure was mostly made of iron and glass, the pitch pine that was used as flooring and in much of the framework "afforded a most inflammable pabulum for the conflagration to feed upon." In a particularly evocative passage the Herald noted that at one point "the whole palace was like a burning coal, and vomiting up fire at a rate that would have done credit to Vesuvius." The vivid scene was captured in a hand-colored lithograph by Currier and Ives in which you can make out a company of red-shirted New York City firemen arriving in the foreground to vainly battle the roaring blaze.

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