Madison Square Garden’s Secret Underground World: 5 Mind-Blowing Facts You Never Knew
Here are the top 5 things you need to know about the legendary arena.
1. It is home to a secret, fully operational train station. Deep beneath the Garden is the historic Penn Station, but the Garden itself has its own private, unseen rail platform built for exclusive VIP and freight use.
2. The original building was in a completely different location. The first Madison Square Garden (1879) stood at Madison Square Park, far north of its current Midtown home, and was an open-air amphitheater inspired by the Colosseum.
3. It has hosted a U.S. presidential assassination attempt. In 1912, a man shot at former President Theodore Roosevelt as he left the Garden. Roosevelt, famously, was only wounded and still gave his planned speech.
4. A direct train can take you to the 1939 World’s Fair. The Long Island Rail Road still runs a hidden track from beneath the Garden, a remnant of a special spur line that once whisked passengers to the fairgrounds in Queens.
5. You can live inside the giant sphere. The 100-foot-tall spherical SkyBox in the main lobby is actually an LED scoreboard that has been repurposed into a private, sound-proof, rotating event space for exclusive parties.