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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The Making of the White City (Part 2)

[Continued from Part 1] A great stage decked with ambitious scenery Perhaps the first thing that would strike a stranger entering the World’s Fair grounds in the summer of 1892 would be the silence of the place, the next the almost theatrical unreality of the impression by the sight of an assemblage of buildings so startlingly out of the common in size and form. When I speak of the silence, I mean the effect of silence. There are seven [...]

By Scott|2025-07-23T10:15:53-05:00February 13th, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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The Making of the White City (Part 1)

Few essays about the fairgrounds for the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition better capture the creative energy of its construction than H. C. Bunner’s “The Making of the White City.” The American novelist, journalist, and poet Henry Cuyler Bunner (1855–1896) visited Jackson Park in Chicago during the summer of 1892. There he witnessed laborers assembling the great exhibit halls, hundreds of smaller structures, and magnificent landscaping in advance of the October 1892 Dedication Day ceremony. While Bunner employs an ornate [...]

By Scott|2024-09-13T13:11:20-05:00February 12th, 2023|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , |1 Comment
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Oct. 6-20, 2022: “Olmsted in Chicago: Iconic Greenspaces and the 1893 White City” (online seminar)

To mark the 200th anniversary of the birth of renowned landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, Sr, the Newberry Library is hosting a seminar on "Olmsted in Chicago: Iconic Greenspaces and the 1893 White City." The online seminar will run for three Thursday sessions from 6-8pm on October 6, 13, and 20. Hosting the sminar will be Julia Bachrach, consulting historian and preservationist and author of The City in a Garden: A History of Chicago’s Parks, and Rebecca S. Graff, Associate [...]

By Scott|2022-12-10T09:57:13-06:00August 24th, 2022|Categories: EVENTS (past)|Tags: , |0 Comments
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Olmsted’s Three Visions for Jackson Park

The National Association for Olmsted Parks has posted a fascinating look at "Olmsted’s Three Visions for Jackson Park" by Julia Bachrach. She explores the designs by Frederick Law Olmsted for South Park in 1871, the fairgrounds of the World’s Columbian Exposition in 1893, and return of Jackson Park in 1895. Construction in 1891 of the fairgrounds for the 1893 World's Fair.

By Scott|2022-08-11T15:41:18-05:00July 17th, 2022|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , |0 Comments
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June 17-18, 2022: Celebrate Olmsted 200 in Chicago

April 26, 2022, marks the bicentennial of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted, social reformer and visionary founder of American landscape architecture. In June, the Olmsted 200 celebration reaches Chicago with a Olmsted Bicentennial Gala from 7– 9 PM on Friday, June 17, at the Glessner House (1800 S Prairie Ave. in Chicago). On Saturday, June 18, at 10 AM, an "Inspired by Olmsted" carillon concert at the Rockefeller Memorial Chapel (5850 S. Woodlawn Avenue in Chicago) and the [...]

By Scott|2022-08-11T15:26:31-05:00May 30th, 2022|Categories: EVENTS (past)|Tags: |0 Comments
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The Master Mind of the 1893 World’s Fair

Today is the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted—landscape architect, author, conservationist, and social activist. His ambitious designs transformed Jackson Park in Chicago into the fairgrounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago. The excerpt below, from the November 1, 1893, issue of the Chicago Inter Ocean newspaper, is quick to credit the many important architects who together designed the fairgrounds. From Olmsted’s seminal vision, though, emerged the Dream City on Lake Michigan. [The article [...]

By Scott|2022-04-26T17:49:21-05:00April 26th, 2022|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: |1 Comment
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Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi’s Visit to the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Part 1

“My only ambition has been to engrave my name at the feet of great men and in the service of grand ideas.” —Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi in 1880. Most monographs about Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi conclude his story with the 1886 unveiling ceremony for his Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor. A lesser-known chapter in the French sculptor’s life involves his next and final trip to the United States in 1893, a six-week visit from [...]

By Scott|2024-10-22T14:28:10-05:00July 5th, 2021|Categories: HISTORY|Tags: , , , , |1 Comment
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“Frederick Law Olmsted” podcast from Cream City Windy City

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 [...]

By Scott|2021-04-25T10:08:07-05:00April 27th, 2021|Categories: AUDIO, NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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Apr. 26, 2021-2022: Olmsted 200: Celebrating Olmsted and Parks for All People

2022 marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted, social reformer and founder of American landscape architecture. The National Association for Olmsted Parks and partners have launched a year-long celebration to explore Olmsted’s living legacy. Olmsted 200 offers an array of activities and events across the country designed to introduce you to Frederick Law Olmsted and the importance of his work and ideas. One of the "Pillars of the Fair," Olmsted served as chief landscape architect [...]

By Scott|2021-05-02T11:47:03-05:00April 26th, 2021|Categories: EVENTS (past)|Tags: |0 Comments
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Sept. 24, 2020: “Designed to Dazzle and Delight” Olmsted and the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition (online)

On Thursday, September 24, 2020, The National Association for Olmsted Parks will host Chicago parks historian Julia Bachrach, who will offer a lecture "Designed to Dazzle and Delight" about landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted and the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. The special program will be help at 7:30 p.m. Eastern Time using Zoom. Advance registration is required.

By Scott|2022-03-05T10:59:58-06:00September 5th, 2020|Categories: EVENTS (past)|Tags: |0 Comments
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Eight Famous Parks Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted

"8 Famous Parks Designed by Frederick Law Olmsted, Plus a Tiny One You May Not Know About" by Wendy Bowman reviews many of the great works by landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who died on this day in 1903. Included are the fairgrounds of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition and the adjacent (and often overlooked) Washington Park in Chicago. Olmsted & Vaux’s 1871 South Park Plan (from the Chicago Park District).

By Scott|2020-08-29T09:33:31-05:00August 28th, 2020|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , , |0 Comments
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Olmsted 200: The Frederick Law Olmsted Bicentennial Celebration

April 26, 2022, marks the bicentennial of the birth of Frederick Law Olmsted, landscape architect of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. A celebration is being planned in honor of the author, journalist, city planner, landscape architect, public official, and creative genius who transformed the modern American landscape. Olmsted 200 will be a coordinated national and local celebration, engaging wide and inclusive audiences in examining the foundational principles of Olmsted’s democratic vision, values, and resilient designs. The Bicentennial will bring [...]

By Scott|2023-08-05T08:34:36-05:00April 26th, 2020|Categories: NEWS|Tags: |0 Comments
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Frederick Law Olmsted’s 1893 Report to the American Institute of Architects

Equaling or surpassing the grandeur of the White City palaces were the awesome scenic grounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition. The eminent landscape architect Frederick Law Olmsted, who had laid out New York's Central Park and the Chicago suburb of Riverside, transformed Jackson Park (“the least park-like ground within miles of the city”) into a garden of stunning beauty enjoyed by tens of millions of visitors. In this report to the American Institute of Architects (published The American [...]

By Scott|2020-04-26T15:18:28-05:00April 26th, 2020|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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Updates on Plans for the Obama Presidential Center in Jackson Park

The 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition emerged from an idea to a White City on the lake in a little more than three years. Building the Obama Presidential Center (OPC) along one edge of Jackson Park certainly will take much longer—if it materializes in that location at all. “The Obama Foundation first announced its site in Jackson Park back in 2016 and hoped to break ground in late 2018 after gaining city approvals that spring.” reports Curbed Chicago. “Two years [...]

By Scott|2020-01-31T16:20:49-06:00February 2nd, 2020|Categories: NEWS|Tags: , , , , |0 Comments
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Frederick Law Olmsted and the Spark of Genius

The Wooded Island in the fairgrounds of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. On the anniversary of the death of Frederick Law Olmsted (April 26, 1822 – August 28, 1903), we endeavor that the memory of his name and personality is not dimmed in the passage of years. This tribute to Olmsted’s design of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition comes from the May 3, 1893, issue of Garden and Forest, written just after Opening Day on the fairgrounds. In [...]

By Scott|2019-08-17T13:03:52-05:00August 28th, 2019|Categories: REPRINTS|Tags: , |1 Comment
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Pillars of the Fair: John Root and Henry Codman

Two pillars of the 1893 World’s Fair died unexpectedly before they could complete their work on the fairgrounds. Even the preliminary architectural contributions of both men, however, played a monumental role in the success of the Columbian Exposition. So, it was fitting that a small monument to the memory of these two leading designers graced the fairgrounds. John Wellborn Root (left) and Henry Sargent Codman (right). Glorious achievements January 13 marks the anniversary of the death of [...]

By Scott|2022-12-10T10:11:00-06:00January 13th, 2019|Categories: HISTORY, LOST & FOUND|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , |2 Comments
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Columbian Exposition Books from 2018

The 125th anniversary year of the World’s Columbian Exposition offered scholarship, images, and fiction relating to the World’s Fair in several new publications in 2018. Pioneers of Promotion: How Press Agents for Buffalo Bill, P. T. Barnum, and the World’s Columbian Exposition Created Modern Marketing by Joe Dobrow. University of Oklahoma Press. Communications professional and business history writer Joe Dobrow traces the origins of modern American marketing by shining the spotlight on three men: pioneers of promotion John M. [...]

By Scott|2024-10-27T12:19:09-05:00January 5th, 2019|Categories: FICTION, PRODUCTS, RESEARCH|Tags: , , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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Icons of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition notecards

The Museum of Science and Industry (MSI) in Chicago held their “Revel in the White City” virtual simulation at the museum on May 19 and May 20 to a packed auditorium. It was spectacular. Making the event even more festive were a set of posters designed by Chicago artist David Lee Csicsko, titled “Icons of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition.” Greeting cards of the set of eight images were available for sale at the museum. Csicsko is an acclaimed [...]

By Scott|2022-03-05T10:20:57-06:00May 20th, 2018|Categories: PRODUCTS, VISUAL ARTS|Tags: , , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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Chicago: City of the Century (2003)

News of the passing of David Ogden Stiers on March 3 has garnered tributes to the actor’s unforgettable role on M*A*S*H and his voice performances for several animated film from Disney Studios. Mr. Stiers also played a small but valuable role in the history of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition, serving as the narrator of one of the first documentaries about the great fair. Chicago: City of the Century, based on the 1996 book of the same title by [...]

By Scott|2024-05-19T17:54:09-05:00March 9th, 2018|Categories: NEWS, VIDEO|Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , |0 Comments
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