An Archive of Past Events
Relating to the 1893 World’s Fair
Mar. 3, 2020: World’s Fair Auction #36 closes
Columbian Exposition collectors may be interested in World’s Fair Auction #36, now open for preview. Online bidding closes on Tuesday, March 3, 2020. The auction catalog can be viewed at: http://www.worldsfairauction.com/cgi-bin/catalog.cgi. Lots 22 through 59 are items related to the 1893 World’s Fair, and include several products commemorating various building of the White City: a handsome powder jar made of milk glass and featuring a color image of an unusual vista of the Administration Building. a rare Parker Brothers "World's Fair Picture Puzzle" complete with 23 large jigsaw pieces in original box. a hand-written letter from a visitor on [...]
Feb. 8, 2020: Talking Trash About the 1893 World’s Fair (West Bend, WI)
The Museum of Wisconsin Art (MOWA) in West Bend, Wisconsin, is hosting a talk on "The Vanishing City: Excavating the World’s Fair of 1893" on Saturday, February 8, 2020, from 2-3:30 pm. Rebecca Graff, associate professor of anthropology at Lake Forest College (IL), divulges what is hiding beneath the surface of Jackson Park. Professor Graff will discuss her archaeological and archival research focused on the Fair’s ephemeral “White City” and Midway Plaisance. The results of the excavation in Jackson Park revealed a robust archaeological signature of the extensive sanitary infrastructure of the Fair and, surprisingly, delicate plaster remains of [...]
Jan. 28, 2020: World’s Fair History Happy Hour at the Chicago History Museum
The Chicago History Museum will host History Happy Hour with an 1893 World’s Fair theme on Tuesday, January 28, from 6-9 pm. The Chicago 00 Project will offer a preview of their 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition virtual reality experience. Guests will be taken on an immersive tour of the world’s fair, known for its dazzling White City and eclectic Midway Plaisance, experiencing Chicago’s past and present in 360 degrees and flying 264 feet in the air on a virtual ride of the world’s first Ferris Wheel. Museum staff will share information about some of the unique World’s Fair items in [...]
Jan. 20, 2020: John Mark Hansen Discusses “The City in a Garden” (Chicago)
For a short time in 1893, the Hyde Park and Kenwood neighborhoods of Chicago bordered the capital of the world, as millions visited the World’s Columbian Exposition in Jackson Park and the Midway Plaisance. The City in a Garden, a new book by John Mark Hansen explores the history of these neighborhoods: Chicago suburb, world’s fair grounds, college town, the city’s first stably integrated community, Hyde Park and Kenwood have many distinctions. The City in a Garden tells the neighborhood’s story through the experiences and lives of its residents. Paul Cornell, the Illinois Central Railroad, the South Park system, [...]
Jan. 11-12, 2020: “Sangamon Songs” Musical Play Tells of Illinois Boy Who Visited the 1893 World’s Fair (Skokie, IL)
A diary written by a 16-year-old Illinois boy who visited the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago is the source material for a new musical. Sangamon Songs: A Musical Play by Tom Irwin and John W. Arden will be performed at Skokie Theatre for Performing Arts on Jan. 11 and 12, 2010. After discovering Harry Glen Ludlam’s journal in his family farmhouse, Tom Irwin began composing an acoustic song cycle about late-nineteenth-century life of a teenager in a small town in Central Illinois. Funded by a Kickstarter campaign, his 2012 album Sangamon Songs collected twelve of the pieces, including one [...]
Jan. 10, 2020: James Hagy Presentation on Magicians at the Columbian Exposition (Chicago)
The January 10 luncheon of the Caxton Club of Chicago features James Hagy, co-author with Sage Hagy of Fair Tricks: The Magicians at the Columbian Exposition, Chicago 1893. Recent scholarship has confirmed the long-assumed basic presence of a young Howard Thurston and an even younger Harry Houdini, both then unknown but who would soon become the two most recognized magicians of the vaudeville era. But how extensive were conjurors’ contributions to the “Magic of the White City”? Fair Tricks pulls back the (non-existent) curtain of the Midway to reveal the remarkable range of world magicians who appeared in, and around, [...]
Louisville celebrates 1893 World’s Fair sculptor Enid Yandell
Louisville, Kentucky, is celebrating hometown sculptor Enid Yandell (1870-1934) with a series of events in 2019. The Louisville native, who studied under Auguste Rodin and Frederick MacMonnies, contributed several notable works to the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. Yandell sculpted the four caryatids supporting the railing of the roof garden of the Woman’s Building. She was selected for the job for Bertha Palmer, President of the Board of Lady Managers and herself a Kentucky native. The artist also created a statue of Daniel Boone for the Kentucky Building. After the Fair, the sculpture was cast in bronze and [...]
Oct. 31, 2019: “Devil In The White City” Halloween party (Chicago)
Flight Club, a social darts club with bar and restaurant, will re-imagine the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair for Halloween with a "Devil In The White City" party. For $49, partiers can toss back darts, drinks & dinner amidst the madness, magicians, fortune-tellers & murder mysteries. Flight Club is located at 111 W. Wacker Drive in Chicago.
Oct. 24, 2019: “A History of Illinois Ferris Wheels and the 1893 Columbian Exposition” (Assumption, IL)
Macon County Historian Mark Sorensen will speak about the 1893 World’s Fair at the Oct. 24 meeting of the Assumption Historical Society in Assumption, IL. His illustrated talk on “A History of Illinois Ferris Wheels and the 1893 Columbian Exposition” starts at 6:30 p.m. at the Bromwell Lodge (225 N. Chestnut St. in Assumption) and is free and open to the public.
Oct. 22, 2019: World’s Fair Auction #35 closes
Columbian Exposition collectors may be interested in World’s Fair Auction #35, now open for preview. Online bidding closes on Tuesday, October 22, 2019. The auction catalog can be viewed at: http://www.worldsfairauction.com/cgi-bin/catalog.cgi. Lots 17 through 55 are items related to the 1893 World’s Fair, and include several products commemorating various building of the White City: a lovely "Columbus Panorama" tri-fold book that depicts "American Declaration of Independence July 4th, 1776," the "Discovery of America," and "The Proclamation of Emancipation of Slaves by Abraham Lincoln, on January 1st, 1863" (image below); an Administration Building match safe; a shaving mug featuring a [...]