[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 [...]
[Part 1 of this article describes the commission and construction of Carl Rohl-Smith’s statue of Benjamin Franklin for the Electricity Building at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition.] “I begin to be almost sorry I was born so soon, since I cannot have the happiness of knowing what will be known one hundred years hence.” —Benjamin Franklin, July 27, 1783 The capital of the world vanished like a sweet dream after the fairgrounds of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in [...]
Vestiges of the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition can be found scattered around the globe … if you know where to look. Several sites related to the World’s Fair are included in the 2019 Open House Chicago, held on October 19-20, 2019: Decorators Supply Corp. (3610 S. Morgan St.) manufactured cast ornamental plaster that helped create the mouldings for the buildings of the "White City" at the 1893 World's Fair. St. John Cantius Roman Catholic Church (825 N. Carpenter St., Chicago) features [...]
In conjunction with their exhibit “Treasures from the White City: The Chicago World’s Fair of 1893," the Richard H. Driehaus Museum in Chicago is offering a series of walking tours titled “Chicago's Gold Coast Patronage and the 1893 World's Fair” on Saturdays from 1-2:30 pm between September 8 to October 13. Led by Sally Kalmbach, the tour will explore Chicago’s famous Gold Coast neighborhood. Still one the most beautiful and architecturally rich neighborhoods in the city, the Gold Coast [...]
Today we celebrate the anniversary of the birth of Robert Swain Peabody on February 22, 1845. Peabody was a cofounder of the Boston architectural firm of Peabody & Stearns, designer of Machinery Hall (also known as the Palace of Mechanical Arts) and the Massachusetts Pavilion for the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago. Architects invited by Daniel Burnham to contribute building for the World's Columbian Exposition gathered in Chicago on January 10, 1891. Robert S. Peabody traveled from the east [...]
PICTURESQUE WORLD’S FAIR. AN ELABORATE COLLECTION OF COLORED VIEWS Page 29 - NORTH LAGOON AND THE MERCHANT TAILORS' BUILDING NORTH LAGOON AND THE MERCHANT TAILORS' BUILDING.—It was hardly to be expected that a building erected by a special class of exhibitors would compare favorably in classic beauty of conception and in all architectural features With anything produced by the great artists of the Exposition, but such was certainly the case. The Merchant Tailors' Building was an architectural gem, inside and [...]
