Scott, Author at Chicago's 1893 Worlds Fair

The Indian guru who spoke at the 1893 World’s Fair
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The Indian guru who spoke at the 1893 World’s Fair

NEWS

The Indian guru who spoke at the 1893 World’s Fair

“One morning in September 1893, a 30-year-old Indian man sat on a curb on Chicago’s Dearborn Street wearing an orange turban and a rumpled scarlet robe. He had come to the United States to speak at the Parliament of the World’s Religions, part of the famous World Columbian Exposition. The trouble was, he hadn’t actually been invited …” Read more about Swami Vivekananda’s time at the 1893 World’s Fair in Jennie Rothenberg Gritz's “The Indian Guru Who Brought Eastern [...]

By Scott|2022-10-08T09:53:16-05:00October 11th, 2022|Categories: NEWS|Tags: Swami Vivekananda, World's Congress of Religions|0 Comments

Listen to the journey of the Viking Ship to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago
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Listen to the journey of the Viking Ship to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago

AUDIO, NEWS

Listen to the journey of the Viking Ship to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago

Few surviving artifacts from the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition are as treasured as the Viking, an exact replica of the Gokstad ship that sailed from Norway to be displayed at the Fair. Friends of the Viking Ship in Geneva, Illinois, work to preserve and educate about the Viking and her crew. They have released a new audiobook version of Viking: From Norway to America (Friends of the Viking Ship, 2014), an English translation of the memoir written by crew [...]

By Scott|2023-04-09T09:02:04-05:00October 10th, 2022|Categories: AUDIO, NEWS|Tags: Viking Ship|0 Comments

Feeding the masses on Chicago Day
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Feeding the masses on Chicago Day

REPRINTS

Feeding the masses on Chicago Day

A photograph by Charles Dudley Arnold of the lovely Café de la Marine (Marine Café) designed by architect Henry Ives Cobb. [Image from Arnold, C. D.; Higinbotham, H. D. Official Views of the World’s Columbian Exposition. Press Chicago Photo-gravure Co., 1893.] A sea of humanity poured into the fairgrounds of the World’s Columbian Exposition on Chicago Day (October 9, 1893). The “greatest gathering in history” shattered all previous attendance records with 713,646 paid admissions to the Fair and over three-quarters [...]

By Scott|2022-10-07T08:39:28-05:00October 9th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Chicago Day, Wellington Catering Company|0 Comments

Keanu pulls a Reeves-versal and ditches the “Devil”
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Keanu pulls a Reeves-versal and ditches the “Devil”

NEWS

Keanu pulls a Reeves-versal and ditches the “Devil”

If you’ve been holding your breath since the January 2023 announcement that Keanu Reeves would star in The Devil in the White City mini-series … you can exhale now. He’s out, according to Deadline. The on-again-off-again limited series currently “in production” at Hulu has lost its make-no-little-plans Director of Works for the 1893 World’s Fair. Daniel Burnham (left) discussing his role as Director of Works for the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition with Devil in the White City hopeful [...]

By Scott|2022-10-08T09:14:46-05:00October 8th, 2022|Categories: NEWS|Tags: Devil in the White City (screen)|0 Comments

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

REPRINTS

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

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 [...]

By Scott|2022-10-07T08:01:02-05:00October 7th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Captive Balloon, Street in Cairo, Temple of Luxor|0 Comments

A Wild Conglomeration of Absurd Fantasies
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A Wild Conglomeration of Absurd Fantasies

REPRINTS

A Wild Conglomeration of Absurd Fantasies

On May 25, 1893, Mr. E. A. Hodge departed Marion, Kansas, heading to the World’s Columbian Exposition. A few days after arriving in Chicago, he wrote home advising other visitors: “Don’t plan to stay here less than ten days—thirty are better, and if you want to study the exhibits you can put in three months.” (Marion Record, June 9, 1893) His letter of July 7, printed in the July 27 issue of the Marion Record (when he finally had [...]

By Scott|2022-10-04T06:06:59-05:00October 4th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: visitors|0 Comments

“Crazy Enthusiasm” for Ignacy Paderewski at the 1893 World’s Fair
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“Crazy Enthusiasm” for Ignacy Paderewski at the 1893 World’s Fair

REPRINTS, Uncategorized

“Crazy Enthusiasm” for Ignacy Paderewski at the 1893 World’s Fair

Among the constellation of famous (or soon-to-be-famous) visitors to the 1893 World’s Fair, few stars shined as bright as pianist Ignacy Jan Paderewski (1860–1941). Wherever he performed, concert halls filled with passionate and adoring fans. The musical celebrity with wild and alluring red hair cast a spell over the women in the audience. One pundit, in the days before Paderewski’s concert at the opening of the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, diagnosed their craze as “Paddymania.” The Musical Courier [...]

By Scott|2022-12-10T09:57:36-06:00September 25th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS, Uncategorized|Tags: Ignacy Paderewski, May 2 1893, May 4 1893, Music Hall|0 Comments

“It filled me with a great wonder and excitement” Ignacy Paderewski Remembers the 1893 World’s Fair
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“It filled me with a great wonder and excitement” Ignacy Paderewski Remembers the 1893 World’s Fair

REPRINTS

“It filled me with a great wonder and excitement” Ignacy Paderewski Remembers the 1893 World’s Fair

Who possessed enough star power to follow President Grover Cleveland after he triumphantly opened the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago on May 1, 1893? That honor went to the most famous musician of the time—twenty-two-year-old Polish pianist Ignacy Jan Paderewski, who commanded the stage in Music Hall the next night. His finesse with the ivory keys, his unwieldy mass of luxuriant red hair, and his stage magnetism earned him great celebrity, a devoted and swooning audience, and more than [...]

By Scott|2022-12-10T09:57:31-06:00September 24th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: Ignacy Paderewski, Music Hall|0 Comments

The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 2)
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The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 2)

HISTORY

The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 2)

[Part 1 of this article describes the commission and construction of Carl Rohl-Smith’s statue of Benjamin Franklin for the Electricity Building at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition.] “I begin to be almost sorry I was born so soon, since I cannot have the happiness of knowing what will be known one hundred years hence.” —Benjamin Franklin, July 27, 1783 The capital of the world vanished like a sweet dream after the fairgrounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in [...]

By Scott|2022-09-04T09:03:18-05:00September 4th, 2022|Categories: HISTORY|Tags: Benjamin Franklin (statue), Carl Rohl-Smith, Electricity Building, George Pullman, John J. Boyle, Richard Henry Park, Solon S. Beman, Theodore Roosevelt|0 Comments

The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 1)
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The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 1)

HISTORY

The Plaster Lighting Catcher of the 1893 World’s Fair: Carl Rohl-Smith’s Benjamin Franklin statue (Part 1)

“The scientists says that electricity is life. Then Jackson Park is of a truth a living thing.” — H. D. Northrop, The World's Fair as Seen in One Hundred Days (1893) A crowd of fans sporting blue and red poured out of the new Franklin Field in Philadelphia on the first day of October in 1895, a warm and sunny start to the college football season. Elated with the Quaker’s 40–0 victory over the visiting team from Swarthmore College, [...]

By Scott|2022-09-04T09:06:10-05:00September 3rd, 2022|Categories: HISTORY|Tags: Benjamin Franklin (statue), Carl Rohl-Smith, Electricity Building, Enid Yandell, Henry Van Brunt, Herman Vilhelm Bissen, Mark Twain|1 Comment

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