The Victoria Theatre opened on Broadway at 42nd Street in 1899, produced by Oscar Hammerstein I and designed by architect J.B. McElfatrick. Legendary performers such as Houdini, Bert Williams, W.C. Fields, the Keatons, Charlie Chaplin, the Seven Little Foys, and the infamous Evelyn Nesbit and her red swing graced its stage. The Victoria premiered Charles Dillingham’s first musical, The Office Boy, and Lew Dockstader’s Minstrel Show. One of the theatre’s most prominent features was the Paradise Roof Garden, an open-air show palace. This rooftop site featured a popular Dutch-style farm including live cows, chickens, goats, costumed milkmaids, and a pond with ducks. In 1915, Hammerstein sold the theatre to S.L. “Roxy” Rothafel, who immediately gutted it and built Times Square’s first movie theatre, the Rialto.