Harriet Monroe’s History of the World’s Fair (Part 5)

[Previous installments of this series include Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.] This fifth part of Harriet Monroe’s “The World's Columbian Exposition” from John Wellborn Root: A Study of His Life and Work (Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1896) describes how John Root in late 1890 assembled the “best fruit” of American architecture to design the buildings of the 1893 World’s Fair. Part 5: Expect to be Judged by the World Root looked upon the Columbian Exposition [...]

Harriet Monroe’s History of the World’s Fair (Part 4)

[Previous installments of this series include Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.] "John Root made the Fair until he died," asserted Owen F. Aldis. We present this fourth part of Harriet Monroe’s “The World's Columbian Exposition” from John Wellborn Root: A Study of His Life and Work (Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1896) on the anniversary of John Root’s death, on January 15, 1891. In this section, Monroe describes the continuing chaos and “hot war” in the fall of [...]

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS (p. 22)

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 22 MACHINERY HALL FROM THE SOUTHEAST.—The Spanish Renaissance style adopted by the gifted architects who designed Machinery Hall, enabled a beautiful effect and the north and east facades of the great building ranked in most respects with the grandest of the Exposition. The illustration here afforded shows the southeast corner of the structure and most of its east frontage, and gives a fair idea of the many attractive elements. [...]

By |2018-03-11T14:38:54-05:00January 15th, 2018|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , |0 Comments

Harriet Monroe’s History of the World’s Fair (Part 3)

[Previous installments of this series include Part 1 and Part 2] Today marks the 125th anniversary of the passing of Henry Sargent Codman, who died unexpectedly while recovering from an appendectomy on January 13, 1893, at the young age of 29. As Frederick Law Olmsted's protégé, Codman influenced the design of the Columbian Exposition fairgrounds in substantial and creative ways, as described in this third part of Harriet Monroe’s “The World's Columbian Exposition” from John Wellborn Root: A Study [...]

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS (p. 21)

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 21 BIRD'S EYE VIEW OF THE WOODED ISLAND.—It was soon discovered after the World's Fair had become a reality, that, from various points of vantage, views could be secured of a scope and beauty unsought and unexpected by the architect or landscape gardener. From the tops of certain buildings there opened vistas such as could have only been imagined by the poet or the painter. The illustration given above [...]

Harriet Monroe’s History of the World’s Fair (Part 2)

[Part 1 of this series can be found here] This second part of Harriet Monroe’s “The World's Columbian Exposition” from John Wellborn Root: A Study of His Life and Work (Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1896) begins with a look at how architect John Root in 1890 was thinking about the “alluring problem” of how and where Chicago might host the upcoming World’s Fair. Mentioned in this section is Horace G. H. Tarr (1844-1922), who served during the Civil War [...]

Harriet Monroe’s History of the World’s Fair (Part 1)

“The World’s Columbian Exposition has never been so well revealed and appreciated as through her imagination and her eyes,” wrote renowned poet William Carlos Williams, describing fellow poet and publisher Harriet Monroe (1860–1936). “And her part in it was distinguished.” Two of Monroe’s distinguished accomplishments served as bookends to the 1893 World’s Fair. The Dedication Day Ceremony held on the fairgrounds on October 21, 1892, featured a reading of an excerpt of her monumental poem “The Columbian Ode.” Harriet [...]

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS (p. 20)

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 20 BIRD'S-EYE VIEW LOOKING SOUTH.—It is difficult to determine what first attracts attention in this picture—the mirror surfaces of water, the cluster of state buildings, or the distant but easily recognized outlines of the great Exposition buildings. Certain it is that Nature, in all her loveliness, never appeared more at her best or appealed more bewitchingly than she does in these two sequestered sheets of water. The crowded roofs [...]

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS (p. 19)

PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 19 THE ELECTRICITY BUILDING.— A brilliant picture is presented of the palace for the accommodation of Electricity, a Science and Industry that at our Centennial had little more than a name — much less a habitation. Its architecture speaks the romance of the Italian Renaissance; its contents, the magic of modern electrical science. The view here allows the eye to sweep the whole of the north and east fronts, [...]

By |2018-03-11T14:39:30-05:00January 3rd, 2018|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |0 Comments

P. T. Barnum’s “What the Fair Should Be”

The new musical biopic The Greatest Showman starring Hugh Jackman is shining the spotlight on the life and time of Phineas Taylor Barnum. Although the legendary circus showman died before the Columbian Exposition opened in Chicago in May of 1893, Barnum penned some thoughts on the upcoming World's Fair--then slated for 1892 in a still undetermined city. His short piece was published in March 1890 issue of The North American Review. Perhaps the greatest showman on Earth would have enjoyed the "stupendousness of [...]

By |2017-12-31T10:14:31-06:00December 31st, 2017|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , |1 Comment
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