Academy of Music (New York City)

The Academy of Music began in 1854 as a grand opera house at the corner of 14th Street and Irving Place. Its founders aimed to make opera accessible to the public, but it quickly became the exclusive domain of New York society, characterized by private boxes that were jealously guarded by the city's old-money families. This air of exclusivity was so pronounced that it eventually provoked the rise of a new generation of wealthy New Yorkers who were frozen out of the venue, leading them to build their own competing stage, the Metropolitan Opera House, in 1883.