"Hurrah for the Red, White and Blue!" [Image from World's Fair Puck, July 3, 1893.] At 11 o'clock on July 4, 1893, crowds filled around a grandstand east of Terminal Station on the fairgrounds of the World's Fair in Chicago. A band opened the ceremonies with a medley of American airs, beginning with "Hail Columbia" and ending with "Yankee Doodle."
The National Park Service explores “Women’s History at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition” with a survey of some related NPS sites, including the Art Institute of Chicago, the Palmer House Hotel, Lorado Taft Midway Studios, a home belonging to Lois Lilley Howe (who submitted a design for the Woman’s Building at the 1893 World’s Fair), and—of course—Jackson Park Historic Landscape District and Midway Plaisance. The dining room of the Palmer House Hotel at the time of the 1893 [...]
The podcast Tour Guide Tell All brings listeners on a visit to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago with their episode “1893 World’s Columbian Exposition: Crossroads of America” (published on April 9, 2021). In just under an hour, Rebecca Fachner and Becca Grawl cover a wide range of subjects, including “famous firsts of the fair,” Lyman J. Gage, Daniel Burnham, Frederick Law Olmsted, Gen. George R. Davis, George Westinghouse, Frederick Douglass, Eadweard Muybridge and much more. The hosts make [...]
The Idaho Building in downtown Boise is a “descendant” of several other Idaho buildings stretching back to the 1893 World’s Fair. Idaho Press history columnist Rick Just tells this story in “A little slice of history: The downtown Boise buildings story”, published on May 22, 2021. The Idaho State Building at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. [Image from Johnson, Rossiter A History of the World's Columbian Exposition Volume 4 - Congresses. D. Appleton and Co., 1898.] Having just [...]
Civil rights activist Ida B. Wells spoke truth to power through her pamphlet The Reason Why the Colored American Is Not in The World’s Columbian Exposition. 10,000 copies were distributed at the 1893 World’s Fair. “With the eyes of the world on Chicago,” explains a new documentary film about Wells, “she would use the international stage to expose the terror of lynching.” On Friday, May 21, 2021, Chicago public television station WTTW will air Ida B. Wells, a one-hour [...]
The latest documentary about the evil doings of H. H. Holmes joins a crowded collection of films and television shows about the “devil in the white city” who killed an unknown number of victims around the time of the World’s Columbian Exposition. It is among the best to date. “Chicago's White City Devil,” the second episode of the Smithsonian Channel’s new series Murderous History, features rather cheesy dramatic scenes along with informative commentary by a group of notable Chicago [...]
“One of my favorite things in the world is the spatula,” confesses Diane T. Sands, host of the podcast This Fact is Overdue. In the episode “The Spatula and the White City” (March 1, 2021), she shares interesting connections between this simple and useful kitchen utensil and the 1893 World’s Fair. Along the way, listeners will learn about Anna M. Mangin, a young Black woman who invented the pastry fork in 1891. Her invention was exhibited in the New [...]
The Great Chicago Quiz Show on WTTW in Chicago has host Geoffrey Baer asking contestants (including some famous Chicagoans) trivia questions about their city. No program about Chicago history would be complete without at least a few tidbits from the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, and Geoffrey asked contestants several , including: • The world’s first Ferris Wheel was a hit at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Jackson Park. In fact, it was so popular that immediately after the [...]
Following a lengthy federal regulatory review, the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) is now preparing for its official groundbreaking in the fall of 2020, and the City of Chicago is beginning pre-construction work in Jackson Park. Updates on the OPC construction can be found at https://www.obama.org/updates/. The OPC campus has several components, all localized in the southwest corner of what was the fairgrounds for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. That space today has a track and football field, playground, bathroom [...]
L. Frank Baum, so the legend goes, used his experience visiting the White City of the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago as inspiration for the Emerald City in his best-selling children's book of 1900, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. A new documentary film exploring the life and times of Baum has been released as part of the American Experience series on PBS. "American Oz, the True Wizard Behind the Curtain" (aired April 19, 2021) includes a segment featuring Baum's [...]
Wendy Bright’s podcast Cream City~Windy City explores interesting connections between Milwaukee and Chicago. Episode #10, “Frederick Law Olmsted,” (released April 21, 2021) focuses on the “Father of Landscape Architecture.” In 1869, Chicago hired the firm of Olmsted, Vaux & Co. to design a park system on the South Side. Twenty-two years later, Frederick Law Olmsted and his associate Henry Codman redesigned Jackson Park and the Midway Plaisance to serve as the fairgrounds for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. Around [...]
The Windy Cities Historians Podcast has been working its way chronologically through Chicago history and has now reached the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. Episodes 19-21, “The Third Star,” are a three-part look at the event now represented in Chicago’s municipal flag. Co-hosts Chris Lynch and Patrick McBriarty interview Paul Durica, the Director of Exhibitions at the Newberry Library and co-editor of the annotated Chicago by Day and Night, and historian and writer Jeff Nichols. The show’s deep dive into [...]
Many small towns sent their best for the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago. "Effingham County [Illinois] had much to be proud of in its contributions to the exhibits in the Woman’s Building at the Columbian Exposition in 1893," writes Delaine Donaldson. "It’s women were achieving success in a variety of ways and were vital to shaping the course of the county’s history and future." See "A Yearlong Celebration" in the the Effingham Daily News (Mar 15, 2021). The [...]
A massive block of vibrant blue azurite and green malachite that was first exhibited at the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago is back on display in the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) in New York. Among the approximately 5,000 pieces on display in their new Allison and Roberto Mignone Halls of Gems and Minerals, which reopened on February 17, 2021, is a popular artifact from the Fair that has come to be known as the “Singing Stone.” The [...]
The Chicago Public Library Blog post "World’s Fair Replicas in Chicago Parks" offers a brief review of four replica sculptures from the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition that can be seen today in various Chicago Parks. These include Daniel Chester French's Statue of the Republic (1918 replica) in Jackson Park, George Wade's Fountain Girl (2012 replica) in Lincoln Park, and Edward Kemey's Prairie King and Sound of the Whoop bison (1911 replicas). Other statues from the 1893 World's Fair grace [...]
“In the summer of 1893 on the shores of Lake Michigan, the United States took its place on the global stage, not through war but through technological innovation ….” The television series American Gods paid a short visit to the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago during Season 3, Episode 5 (“Sister Rising”). The episode opens with an action shot of an elongated coin machine—an unusual but effective historical reference to one of so many “firsts” exhibited at the World’s [...]
The City of Chicago has announced the beginning of a process to review forty-one statues, monuments, murals, and plaques in the city that have been “identified for public discussion.” The list includes four statues that have a direct connection to the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago: The Republic by Daniel Chester French https://chicagomonuments.org/monuments/the-republic This 1918 smaller replica of the original 1893 Statue of the Republic by Daniel Chester French is an enduring icon of the World’s Fair in [...]
In an interview with The Naples Daily, Eric Larson offers this status report on the adaptation of his The Devil in the White City. “It’s slated to be a Hulu series. DiCaprio and Martin Scorsese are still involved, I believe, but as executive producers. I don’t think DiCaprio has any intention of playing the killer Holmes, as was originally contemplated. The saga of adapting Devil for film or TV has been a long one. I’m not holding my breath, [...]
Sneaky devils. Just days after reporting that Robert Pattison was in talks for the role of (alleged) serial killer H. H. Holmes, Giant Freakin Robot has revealed that Matt Damon is a top choice for the lead role in the Hulu adaptation of Erik Larson’s 2003 bestseller about the 1893 World’s Fair, The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair That Changed America. Damon, star of Good Will Hunting (1997), played serial killer Tom Ripley [...]
After nearly two years of silence since the February 2019 announcement that Erik Larson’s 2003 bestseller about the 1893 World’s Fair, The Devil in the White City: Murder, Magic and Madness at the Fair That Changed America, was being developed as a Hulu miniseries, a report on one potential casting has surfaced. Giant Freakin Robot reports that Robert Pattinson currently is in talks for the role of (alleged) serial killer H. H. Holmes in the historical drama. Pattison is [...]
