RECENT POSTS ABOUT THE HISTORY OF THE COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION’S BUILDING, FAIRGROUNDS, EXHIBITS, EVENTS, AND PEOPLE.
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. Here was an extent of five hundred feet, every square yard of which was of elaborate finish, and, aside from [...]
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 of His Life and Work (Houghton, Mifflin & Company, 1896). Part 3: The Happy Collaboration of Gifted Minds Henry [...]
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 is from a photograph taken from the top of the Transportation Building and is that of a scene to be [...]
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 in the 20th Regiment, Connecticut Infantry. Burnham and Root designed the home of Captain Tarr. The “Mr. Aldis, of the Grounds [...]
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 Monroe’s 1896 biography of architect John Root, her brother-in-law, provided an in-depth account of the early days of planning and [...]
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 only make us feel that these leafy nooks were forgotten in the hurry and Dame Nature given a chance to [...]
Is Chicago about to ruin Jackson Park? asks the Cultural Landscape Foundation
"Is Chicago about to ruin Jackson Park?" asks Charles A. Birnbaum, President & CEO of the Cultural Landscape Foundation in an opinion piece published this week in The Huffington Post. Birnbaum highlights several major projects affecting the park that in 1893 was home to the Columbian Exposition. Plans for the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) locate it on the west side of Jackson Park lagoon (approximately where the Woman's Building and Horticultural Building once stood), and an associated parking facility will sit on the east end of the Midway Plaisance (where several exhibits and structures stood during the Fair.) A proposal to consolidate and [...]
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, a distance of three hundred and fifty and seven hundred feet, respectively. The situation is at once apparent. The waters [...]
Happy New Year! Happy 125th Anniversary!
Welcome to 2018 Happy New Year to our readers. 2018 marks the 125th anniversary of the 1893 World's Fair, and we look forward to celebrating the year with posts about the history of the World's Columbian Exposition, images of the fairgrounds, reports on news and events related to the WCE (we expect there will be much happening in 2018!), notices of interesting WCE auctions and collectibles, and other Columbian commemorations. Would we ever be able to see it all? This was the question we asked ourselves each night when we returned home for a few hours of rest after [...]
Architectural Digest selects the top-20 world’s fair buildings of all time
Architectural Digest recently took a look "back at some of the most innovative architecture built for expositions around the globe." In his article "The 20 Boldest Buildings in the History of the World's Fair," Niki Mafi lists the Art Institute of Chicago at #5, behind the Eiffel Tower (Paris, 1889), the Grand Palais (Paris,. 1900), the Royal Exhibition Building (Melbourne, 1880), and the Arc de Triomf (Barcelona, 1888). The classical Beaux-Arts building designed by Shepley, Rutan and Coolidge of Boston is sometimes forgotten as being part of the 1893 World's Fair. Located on Michigan Avenue in the Chicago Loop, the structure [...]