Transported to the Land of the Fairies: A Ride on the Ferris Wheel

The great Ferris Wheel on the Midway Plaisance of the World’s Columbian Exposition opened to the public on June 21, 1893. The following account comes from Mrs. Julia Waugh, whose letter describing her ride on the Ferris Wheel was published in the July 7, 1893, issue of the Crawfordsville (IN) Weekly Journal. She notes that her “memorable trip” was taken the second day after the opening of the attraction, when 1,000 tickets were purchased in the first two hours. [...]

By |2020-06-13T14:39:34-05:00June 21st, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: |2 Comments

Speaking of Whales

The excerpt below, from The Century World’s Fair Book for Boys and Girls by Tutor Jenks (Century Co., 1893), describes the whaling bark Progress exhibited at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The authentic whaling ship from New Bedford, Massachusetts, was moored in the South Pond and served as a floating museum of the fading whaling industry. A view of the Anthropology and Ethnology exhibits along the South Pond of the 1893 World's Fair, showing the whaling [...]

By |2021-02-13T08:33:01-06:00June 15th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: |0 Comments

The 1893 World’s Fair, a Glorified Park

June 8, 1893 was “Princess Eulalia Day” at the World’s Columbian Exposition. Attendance swelled to around 169,000 visitors—the largest yet. Most were eager to catch a glimpse the Infanta from Spain as she toured the fairgrounds. A report from that day reprinted below (originally published in the July 12, 1893, issue of Garden and Forest) makes only a passing mention of the royal guest. Instead, the author focuses on the natural and man-made beauty of the 1893 World’s Fair, while [...]

By |2020-06-05T21:21:25-05:00June 8th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|0 Comments

100. Picturesque World’s Fair – Arabian Horses and Riders

ARABIAN HORSES AND RIDERS.—Ottoman's Arab camp, or the "Wild East Show' as it was finally called, was one of the World's Fair enterprises which, with various striking features, was yet financially unsuccessful. The Bedouins, with their families and equipments, were brought to Chicago by a private company, and the original intention of the promoters of the enterprise was to exhibit them in a park near the Exposition, but this design was, for some reason, impossible of execution, and the [...]

By |2020-10-27T10:19:36-05:00May 6th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |0 Comments

99. Picturesque World’s Fair – Paseleo, A Samoan Chief

PASELEO, A SAMOAN CHIEF.—Splendid specimens of manhood and womanhood physically were the Samoans at the Exposition, and comment was as general upon their fine proportions as upon their intelligence and courtesy of demeanor. It may be that a remembrance of this time when Samoans imperiled their lives so recklessly in aid of the crews of American warships wrecked in the great hurricane at Apia had something to do with the good will shown, but, whatever the cause, the Samoans [...]

By |2020-05-03T11:26:55-05:00April 29th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |0 Comments

Frederick Law Olmsted’s 1893 Report to the American Institute of Architects

Equaling or surpassing the grandeur of the White City palaces were the awesome scenic grounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. The eminent landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who had laid out New York's Central Park and the Chicago suburb of Riverside, transformed Jackson Park (“the least park-like ground within miles of the city”) into a garden of stunning beauty enjoyed by tens of millions of visitors. In this report to the American Institute of Architects (published The American [...]

By |2020-04-26T15:18:28-05:00April 26th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments

98. Picturesque World’s Fair – Kaleife and his Dromedary

KALEIFE AND HIS DROMEDARY.—The Bedouin and the dromedary, "the ship of the desert," were very much in evidence at the Ottoman's Arab camp, or "Wild East Show ' The "ship" when under full sail around the encampment was gorgeously decorated, and his driver was not less brightly appareled. Why in a region as warm as the desert is supposed to be so much covering should be deemed a necessity is hard to say, but on all state occasions both [...]

By |2020-10-27T10:20:32-05:00April 9th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

97. Picturesque World’s Fair – Fettome, A Bedouin Woman

FETTOME, A BEDOUIN WOMAN.—Much as has been written about the Arabs and their wild life upon the North African plains, descriptions have been, as a rule, confined mostly to the men and how the woman of the desert lives, moves and has her being has been left largely to the imagination. So it came that the Bedouin women, at the Columbian Exposition, were looked upon with a good deal of curiosity and were found to be by no means [...]

Columbian Exposition Poetry: “The Man in the Moon”

In honor of World Poetry Day, we offer this whimsical verse from the pen of popular newspaper poet Nixon Waterman, published in the December 1892 issue of Illustrated World's Fair. THE MAN IN THE MOON by Nixon Waterman The man in the moon, as he sails through the sky, Can't help but to turn an admiring eye, And linger a while as he passes the site Of that perfectly wonderful City of White. And he says to himself, "All [...]

By |2022-03-05T11:01:56-06:00March 21st, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , |0 Comments
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