Ford's Theatre, 511 10th Street, earned notoriety on Apr. 14, 1865, at 10:15pm when President Abraham Lincoln was fatally shot by John Wilkes Booth during a performance of Our American Cousin. John Thomson Ford (1829-94), the builder of the theater, was imprisoned for more than a month after the assassination until acquitted of complicity. Congress then forced him to sell the theater, and closed it to further productions. Misfortune struck again in 1893 when part of the edifice collapsed, killing 28 people. Since 1968 the building has been maintained by the National Park Service as a Lincoln museum, with the presidential box restored to its original condition.
In the basement is a Museum of Lincolniana (426-6927), including objects associated with his early years, his public career, and the presidential year. Also the clothes he wore that fateful night, the pistol that ended his life, and the flag that draped his coffin.
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