Apr. 11, 2026 – Feb. 26, 2028: “A Marvel in Motion” tells history of the Ferris Wheel (St. Louis)

The Ferris Wheel had its opening chapter at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago and closing chapter at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. The Missouri History Museum is honoring its enduring legacy with a new exhibit on the great observation wheel. “A Marvel in Motion” shares the history of George Ferris' mechanical monster that was an amusement as well as a bold example of innovation, ambition, and human ingenuity. Historical photographs, original engineering drawings, and artifacts will [...]

By Scott|2026-03-19T06:20:13-05:00March 15th, 2026|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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Stephen Colbert presses the 1893 World’s Fair

While the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition is not common fodder for pundits and comedians on late-night TV shows, all that changed on the evening of March 11, 2026, when the host of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert took on the great Chicago World’s Fair. The U.S. Mint struck its last circulating pennies back in November 2025. We noted the event with a little history about the premiere of elongated coin machines at the 1893 World’s Fair (and a [...]

By Scott|2026-03-13T11:44:30-05:00March 13th, 2026|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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The Devil in the WHAT City?

We love some Jeopardy! aaaaaalmost as much as we love exploring the 1893 World’s Fair. In the Double Jeopardy round on the March 5, 2026, episode, defending one-day champion Quentin Powers found a Daily Double and had this $1,600 clue in the “CITIES IN COLOR” category: “For the color of many buildings, the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago had this nickname referenced in the title of a 2003 bestseller”. “The White City” is the most common moniker given to [...]

By Scott|2026-03-05T14:53:31-06:00March 5th, 2026|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |1 Comment
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Season’s Readings 2025: New Books about the World’s Columbian Exposition

New books explore the colorful campus and souvenir coins of the Columbian Exposition and profile a host of people associated with the Fair, including architect Stanford White and sculptor Augustus Saint-Gaudens, photographer Alice Austen, exhibitors Nancy Green (who portrayed Aunt Jemima) and Louis Vuitton, and another investigation of H.H. Holmes. That devil also creeps into a supernatural thriller. Note: We provide this announcement of new titles without any compensation from authors or publishers. We encourage shopping through independent local [...]

By Scott|2025-12-04T13:11:32-06:00December 4th, 2025|Categories: FICTION, NEWS, RESEARCH|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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Paragon Ragtime Orchestra releases “Meet Me at the Fair!” CD

The Paragon Ragtime Orchestra (PRO) has released a new album of music from great American World’s Fairs, including the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Meet Me at the Fair! (Rialto Records 6008) features nineteen tracks—nearly seventy minutes of exciting music performed by the Paragon Ragtime Orchestra (PRO). Conducted by Rick Benjamin, the PRO features musicians Arthur Moeller (violin), Bernadette Boerckel (soprano), Paul Murphy and Brandon Bergeron (cornets), and the SVC Limited chorus. The album is produced by Judith Sherman, [...]

By Scott|2025-10-30T10:11:23-05:00November 1st, 2025|Categories: AUDIO, NEWS|0 Comments
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1893 Viking Ship featured on “Backstory with Larry Potash”

The October 5, 2025, episode of Backstory with Larry Potash on WGN-TV featured a segment on “The Viking Ship That Took the World by Storm.” The feature story profiles the replica Viking ship that sailed from Norway to Chicago to be displayed at the 1893 World’s Fair. This treasured relic from the Columbian Exposition is preserved today in Geneva, Illinois, under the care of the Friends of the Viking Ship. The episode can be viewed online at https://wgntv.com/backstory/the-viking-ship-that-took-the-world-by-storm/. [...]

By Scott|2025-10-06T17:03:54-05:00October 6th, 2025|Categories: NEWS, VIDEO|Tags: |0 Comments
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From FERRIS to WHEEL in a new puzzle craze

A new word-transformation game is taking puzzlers to new heights of excitement. Raddle, created by Sandy Weisz of Chicago’s puzzle design studio the Mystery League, ran a series of Chicago-themed games last week. A most memorable and mammoth attraction of the 1893 World’s Fair made it into the September 13 game, which featured a Raddle board stretching from “FERRIS” to “WHEEL.” Go for a spin here: https://raddle.quest/2025/09/13

By Scott|2025-09-21T10:53:44-05:00September 22nd, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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Chicago buzzes in for “Inside Jeopardy Live on Tour”

“Inside Jeopardy Live on Tour” brought Ken Jennings and friends to the Windy City on Friday, September 12. Jeopardy! fans gathered in the historic Chicago Theater for a live taping of the “Inside Jeopardy!” podcast, hosted by Michael Davies and Sarah Foss. Special guest appearances by champion Juveria Zaheer and Celebrity Jeopardy! champion W. Kamau Bell rounded out the first half of the night. Then Ken Jennings took the stage to run an interactive Jeopardy! game with the entire audience [...]

By Scott|2025-09-16T19:36:14-05:00September 13th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , |0 Comments
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Aug. 8-Nov. 2, 2025: “Swedes at the Fair” (Swedish American Museum, Chicago)

The Swedish American Museum in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood is running a special exhibit on “Swedes at the Fair” from August 8 through November 2, 2025. The exhibit highlights Swedes and Swedish-American participation in the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition with displays about the Swedish Pavilion, the Swedish Restaurant [including an image from our post "Tales from the Swedish Café"], Sweden Day, the American Union of Swedish Singers, the Royal Swedish Commission, Pehr Samuel Peterson’s tree nursery, the Lapland Village, and [...]

By Scott|2025-08-12T16:20:11-05:00August 13th, 2025|Categories: EXHIBITS (current), NEWS|Tags: , , , |3 Comments
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German Punch Bowl from the 1893 World’s Fair Joins Art Institute of Chicago Collection

A monumental porcelain punch bowl made for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago has returned to this city. On July 11, 2025, the Art Institute of Chicago reopened the Eloise W. Martin Galleries, where 17th-, 18th- and 19th-century European designs are displayed. Among the new works added to the collection is a Rococo punch bowl created by the Royal Porcelain Manufactory (Königliche Porzellan-Manufaktur, K.P.M.) in 1892. This item was one of the many wonders exhibited around the “porcelain [...]

By Scott|2025-07-12T19:31:16-05:00July 12th, 2025|Categories: ANTIQUES, NEWS|Tags: , |0 Comments
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Elevate Winter Guard 2025 performs “In All FAIRness”

The World’s Columbian Exposition has been employed as a theme for several ballet works, and in the spring of 2025 a winter guard treated audiences to a trip to the Chicago fair. Elevate of Indianapolis, Indiana, performed a show titled “In All FAIRness,” inspired by the 1893 World’s Fair and featuring the music of “Merry-Go-Round of Life” by Joe Hisaishi. Competing across the country during the winter months, winter guards perform shows lasting about six-minutes long featuring dance and [...]

By Scott|2025-07-10T12:45:56-05:00July 11th, 2025|Categories: NEWS, THEATER|0 Comments
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The Swami and the Street Sign

Chicago Public Radio’s Curious City, the long-running series on WBEZ that answers questions from listeners about the city and region, has a episode that does a deep dive into one of the most revered visitors to the 1893 World’s Fair. Hindus around the world learn about Swami Vivekananda’s visit to Chicago and his public lectures during the World’s Parliament of Religions in September 1893. The Curious City episode “Why did an honorary street sign go missing in Chicago?” explores [...]

By Scott|2025-07-08T06:15:35-05:00July 8th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , , |0 Comments
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1893 World’s Fair Official Cycling Route from Biketropolis

Although wheelmen (with a few notable exceptions) were forbidden from cycling through the fairgrounds of the 1893 World’s Fair, bicyclists today have much to discover as they ride through Jackson Park. The history of the great exposition is hiding in plain sight, thanks to a new cycling route guide published by Biketropolis®. In collaboration with Arcadia Publishing, True North Cafe, Two Wheel Gear®, and Ride With GPS, Biketropolis has curated a bicycle route that connects the dots of history [...]

By Scott|2025-07-06T10:12:10-05:00July 7th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|0 Comments
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“Referencing Columbiana” by Steve A. Starlust

Columbian Exposition collectors can rejoice over a new reference book that provides invaluable information about commemorative coins, medals, badges and ribbons, and other related souvenirs from the 1893 World’s Fair. The handsome volume Referencing Columbiana compiled by Steve A. Starlust belongs on any Columbian Exposition bookshelf. The 305-page book, which bears the title World’s Columbian Exposition Chicago on the cover (there is no title page), builds upon and greatly expands Nathan N. Eglit’s seminal reference book, Columbiana; The Medallic [...]

By Scott|2025-07-07T15:46:00-05:00July 6th, 2025|Categories: COLLECTING, NEWS, RESEARCH|Tags: |0 Comments
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A Columbian Exposition Enthusiast’s Guide to HBO’s “The Gilded Age”

Viewers of The Gilded Age on HBO Max meet several real historical figures mingling with a cast of colorful fictional characters. Although the series takes place in 1882–84, ten years before the Columbian Exposition will open in Chicago, The Gilded Age features several of the designers, participants, and visitors associated with the 1893 World’s Fair. [This post will be updated as new episodes are released.] Jane Addams Social activist Jane Addams is mentioned in Season 2, Episode 4, when [...]

By Scott|2025-11-14T13:58:44-06:00June 20th, 2025|Categories: NEWS, VIDEO|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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Fun Facts about Pope Leo and the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago

Chicago is losing its Malört over the announcement that Cardinal Robert Prevost was elected to be the first pope from the United States. Born in the Bronzeville neighborhood and raised in Chicago’s south suburbs, Prevost has taken the name Leo XIV. Back in 1893, Pope Leo XIII had a varied—and rather unusual—presence at the World’s Columbian Exposition, held in Chicago’s Jackson Park. Pope Leo XIII loaned many Vatican treasures to be exhibited at the World’s Fair. One theme of [...]

By Scott|2025-05-10T06:23:51-05:00May 10th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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May 29–Jun. 1, 2025: Chicago Steampunk Exposition

What do you get when you combine a World’s Fair with retro-futuristic imagination? The Chicago Steampunk Exposition! For 2025, the convention theme of “The Curse of Cthulhu” will add a dimension of Lovecraftian weird horror. Throughout the weekend of May 29–June 1, 2025, the Expo will host talks, workshops, activities, and shopping for steampunk enthusiasts who enjoy imagining an alternate World’s Columbian Exposition with Gilded Age gothic adventures. The weekend includes live-action role-playing games; an afternoon tea; an Underground [...]

By Scott|2025-08-12T15:48:55-05:00May 4th, 2025|Categories: EVENTS (past), NEWS|1 Comment
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1893 World’s Fair natural history artifact to be restored

A treasured educational display from the 1893 World’s Fair will be restored, thanks to a $2 million gift. Dyche’s Panorama, formally called the “Exhibit of Large North American Mammals,” was originally displayed inside the Kansas State Building at the Columbian Exposition before finding a permanent home at the University of Kansas. Professor Lewis Lindsay Dyche created the panorama to showcase University’s natural history and taxidermy collection and to “awaken a more general interest and teach valuable lessons on the [...]

By Scott|2025-03-14T08:00:55-05:00March 15th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , |0 Comments
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World’s Fair bridge listed among “Chicago’s Most Endangered Buildings 2025”

Preservation Chicago released its “Most Endangered” list for 2025 (on March 4, Chicago's 188th birthday). Included with six threatened buildings is a bridge that allowed tens of millions of visitors to cross the Lagoon during the 1893 World’s Fair. Designed by renowned architectural firm of Burnham & Root, the bridge was built in 1880 and is the oldest extant structure of Frederick Law Olmsted’s original design for Jackson Park. Officially renamed the Clarence Darrow Memorial Bridge in 1957, the [...]

By Scott|2025-03-06T11:57:31-06:00March 7th, 2025|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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Are the lights back on at “Devil in the White City”?

A screen version of The Devil in the White City has flickered back to life. Martin Scorsese and Leonardo DiCaprio’s project to adapt Erik Larson’s 2003 best-selling book about the Columbian Exposition, The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair that Changed America, has been on-again, off-again for fifteen years. Hulu pulled the plug on a proposed miniseries in March of 2023, and all has been dark since then. (A history of the screen [...]

By Scott|2025-01-26T11:39:06-06:00January 26th, 2025|Categories: NEWS, REPRINTS, VIDEO|Tags: |0 Comments
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