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PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR – Egyptian Swordsmen (p. 87)

By |2019-12-17T13:27:33-06:00September 30th, 2019|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 87 – EGYPTIAN SWORDSMEN EGYPTIAN SWORDSMEN.— Among the attractions of a Street in Cairo were a number of swordsmen, some of them very expert in their profession. Their weapons were not of the style in use among Europeans and Americans, but resembled Japanese swords somewhat and had no guard above the hand grip. The blades were not, however, used much in a defensive way, that being left to the [...]

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR – Egyptian Dancing Girls (p. 34)

By |2018-03-11T14:36:21-05:00February 20th, 2018|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , , |

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWSPage 34 – EGYPTIAN DANCING GIRLSEGYPTIAN DANCING GIRLS.—That prominent feature of the Midway Plaisance, a Street in Cairo, had a theatre among its attractions, and what doubtless drew most visitors to this place of entertainment, was the performance of the Egyptian Dancing Girls. The illustration gives excellent portraits of the three dusky beauties who were most prominent there, and shows also the semi-Oriental costume in which they danced. Of the performance it [...]

Famous World’s Fair Name on “Jeopardy!”

By |2024-06-17T21:23:10-05:00June 17th, 2024|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , , , |

“Famous Names” served as the Final Jeopardy category on the June 12, 2024, episode of Jeopardy! The answer was: “Vying with Eiffel, this engineer wanted to create big; an admiring account said the Obelisk of Luxor is too short to be a spoke.” Two of the contestants came up with correct question of is “Who is Ferris?” Pittsburgh engineer George Washington Gale Ferris, Jr., designed his great iron wheel for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. The Ferris Wheel [...]

Angels in the Spandrels: The Winged Decorations of Louis Sullivan’s Transportation Building

By |2024-09-06T10:41:43-05:00April 14th, 2024|Categories: HISTORY, RESEARCH|Tags: , , |

Critics glorified and reviled Louis Sullivan’s renegade design for the Transportation Building at the 1893 World’s Fair. The polychromatic color scheme and the grand Golden Door received the most commentary at the time of the Columbian Exposition, and both elements continue to fascinate students of architecture today. Louis Sullivan’s striking design for the Transportation Building featured a polychromatic façade and majestic “Golden Door” entrance on the east side. [Image from Picturesque World’s Fair. W.B. Conkey, 1894; digitally edited [...]

157. Picturesque World’s Fair – Camel and Driver in Cairo Street

By |2023-10-17T05:30:04-05:00October 17th, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , |

CAMEL AND DRIVER IN CAIRO STREET.—The Cairo Street camels had varied duties to perform, at one time being hurried along with much mauling and gesticulation to convey a rider, or perhaps a couple, from one end of the street to the other and unload them hurriedly to make room for other experimenting people, and again, bedecked with cumbrous trappings, led along the same boisterous thoroughfare to take part in some procession alleged to be a duplicate of what may [...]

The Fair as a Spectacle, Part 3: An Enormous Whirligig of Pleasure

By |2023-07-03T06:41:30-05:00July 2nd, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , |

Continued from Part 2 [Note: This text includes names and descriptions now considered culturally disparaging. Please see our statement on “Potentially Offensive Text and Images.”] THE FAIR AS A SPECTACLE. How it seemed to a visitor—Strolling and dreaming by day and by night. By Charles Mulford Robinson Part 3: An Enormous Whirligig of Pleasure The entrance to the Plaisance was directly beyond this building. Serious purposed womanhood, as personified by the structure, stood before the Plaisance, blocking the way [...]

The Fair as a Spectacle, Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque

By |2023-07-02T13:10:12-05:00July 1st, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , |

Continued from Part 1 [Note: This text includes names and descriptions now considered culturally disparaging. Please see our statement on “Potentially Offensive Text and Images.”] THE FAIR AS A SPECTACLE. How it seemed to a visitor—Strolling and dreaming by day and by night. By Charles Mulford Robinson Part 2: In Search of the Picturesque But in that brief view a lesson was also taught you which you took to heart at once. It was that the charm of the [...]

“Think of it. Three thousand people on a wheel!”

By |2023-06-11T08:42:03-05:00June 21st, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: |

The magnificent Ferris Wheel on the Midway Plaisance of the World’s Columbian Exposition opened to the public on June 21, 1893. Some first-hand accounts of riding in the mechanical monster capture the thrill of what it felt like for those first passengers—many of whom may have never even been in a building with more than a few floors tall—to be lifted into the air. A special correspondence to the San Francisco Morning Call (July 7, 1893) shared this experience [...]

“A Medley of the Midway Plaisance” by A. B. Ward

By |2022-10-07T08:01:02-05:00October 7th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |

The short story reprinted below is a romance set on the Midway Plaisance of the 1893 World’s Fair. Writing as “A. B. Ward,” Mrs. Alice Ward Bailey (1857–1922) was a prolific author of fiction around the turn of the twentieth century. The mawkish prose and bumpy pacing in this story may explain why the author is essentially forgotten today. Still, her dramatic sketch offers an intimate peek into the lives of fictional inhabitants of the Midway and invites us [...]

The Midway Plaisance

By |2022-10-02T10:13:34-05:00October 1st, 2022|

The Midway Plaisance The Midway Plaisance is a six hundred-foot wide by one mile-long strip of land that connects Jackson Park on the east to Washington Park on the west, running for seven blocks between 59th Street on the north and 60th Street on the South. From an initial plan for a “Bazaar of Nations” exhibit, the district evolved into a mix of educational displays enshrouded in a sugarcoating of amusement. The Midway consisted of a most unusual collection [...]

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