Columbian Exposition News
The enduring legacy of the 1893 World’s Fair in modern scholarship, education, the arts, creative products, preservation, and other events.
RECENT POSTS ABOUT COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION NEWS
Season’s Readings: 2023 Books about the World’s Columbian Exposition
This has been a year of rich and valuable additions to the Columbian Exposition bookshelf. Summarized below are important new nonfiction works that explore connections between the Chicago fair and Western Pennsylvania, Lebanon, England, and Massachusetts. Two others look at the religious and spiritual legacy of the Columbian Exposition. New fictional works explore the fairgrounds though the eyes of visitors in both realistic stories and magical adventures. We also [...]
2023 Columbian Exposition Gift Guide
If you are shopping for a gift to give a Columbian Exposition enthusiast or just want to treat yourself to a little something during the holiday season, check on these products relating to the 1893 World’s Fair. Note: We provide this announcement of new products without any compensation from vendors. Prices and availability subject to change. We already reported on a fun new World’s Fair board game, Chicago 1893: [...]
Build your own World’s Fair host city with “Chicago 1893: The City Beautiful” tile game
The Great Chicago Fire of October 1871 has burned a four-mile-long scar across the heart of the city. It’s time to rebuild the city as Chicago plans to host the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. Reach your hands into the bag and select your next tile to create your unique vision of Chicago … before your opponents upset those plans. Chicago 1893: The City Beautiful is a new tile game from [...]
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 1882–83, 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 [...]
Sweet Treats Born at the 1893 World’s Fair
WTTW’s Chicago Stories series has a new episode titled “Candy Capital” that includes a segment about the sweet treats born at the 1893 World’s Fair. The profile discusses Milton Hershey, Frederick and Louis Rueckheim's precursor to Cracker Jack, Bertha Palmer's brownies, and more. The reversed shot of the Court of Honor (shown above) was a little strange, though. If you have recovered from your Halloween candy pile, check out [...]
The Marvel-ous Midway of “Loki” Season 2, Episode 3 “1893”
On a branched timeline in the Marvel® multiverse, a few time travelers, a Norse trickster god, and an artificial intelligence disguised as an orange clock (and thought to be a ghost) visit the Midway Plaisance of the 1893 World’s Fair. Loki Season 2, Episode 3 “1893,” which premiered on Oct. 19, 2023, treated viewers to one of the most beautiful and faithful depictions of the World’s Columbian Exposition fairgrounds [...]
Walt Disney Birthplace Home Opens in Chicago
For two days, lines stretched around the block as hundreds of visitors waited to enter the small cottage of an 1893 World’s Fair worker. Perhaps they came because his son, Walt Disney, was born in this home at 2156 N. Tripp Avenue in Chicago. Long lines of visitors stretched around the block to get into the newly opened Walt Disney Birthplace Home on October 14-15, 2023. The [...]
“No Holmes Barred!” A World’s Fair Radio Show Podcast
History, hilarity, and histrionics characterize a new satirical radio-show podcast about the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. No Holmes Barred! is written, directed, and produced by Daniel Ciarrocchi (you may have seen him on Jeopardy!) and tells the dual stories of Daniel Burnham’s construction of the fairgrounds in Jackson Park and the bloody trail of murderer H. H. Holmes in nearby Englewood. If this premise sounds like a certain [...]
The Humboldt County display in the California State Building at the 1893 World’s Fair
Glen Nash, “The Humboldt Historian,” shares a fascinating look at the Humboldt County display inside the California State Building at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. His article “The County’s Exhibition at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair Sounds Spectacular, but Putting it Together and Getting it Back Was Kind of a Pain in the Ass” appears on the Lost Coast Outpost.
“What shall I wear at the World’s Fair in Chicago?”
If you were planning a trip to the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition, you might ask yourself is “What should I wear?” Marissa Croft of the Chicago History Museum investigates that question with an interesting and insightful blog post about the wide variety of dress at the Fair. Check out “What shall I wear at the World’s Fair in Chicago?” Dressed up for a stroll along the south end of [...]