In 1892, after stiff competition from New York, Chicago was selected by Congress to
be the host city for the World's Columbian Exposition, the 400th
anniversary celebration of Columbus' discovery of America. Chicago was the
perfect location for this extravaganza. The fair's designers created a center
piece of pure grandeur, five exhibit halls in the neoclassic style
surrounding a giant reflecting pool. Officially, it was called the Court of
Honor, but it was quickly dubbed the White City. The fair was one of the great
spectacles of the 19th century. The numbers alone were staggering: attendance
totaled 27 million during the fair's six-month run. 38 states and 60 foreign
countries participated. Over 5,000 exhibits, ranging from the world's
largest cannon to a Liberty Bell made of oranges, were on display. "Architects,
painters, and sculptors of my country, how proud we are of you. No one would ever
have believed that so magnificent a result could have come out of such haste,
even if the Masters of the past had been revivified to do the work.
If this rupture from the past is real and not merely apparent, then the new
American world could take at last a sharp and conscious twist for the
realization of its highest ideals." "I recall nothing in my life which contains
anything of more freshness color or beauty than my first views of the fair.
Here, all at once, out of this dingy City which but a few years before had
waste of wet grass and flats, was now this vast and harmonious collection of
perfectly constructed and snowy white buildings, containing in their interiors
the artistic, mechanical, and scientific achievements of the world to date. This
realized dream of beauty, the splendid picture of the world's own hope for itself."
The future was what visitors to the fair came to see and what a future it would be:
People could dial the first long-distance phone calls from Chicago
to New York, tap their fingers on something called a typewriter, and
thrilled to the sight of the Kinetoscope, the forerunner of motion pictures.
"Zoaproxography allows us to project much larger than the size of life some
particular act of animal locomotion upon a screen."
"Stunned by the majesty of the exposition, my mother sat in her chair, visioning at
all yet comprehending little of its meaning. Her life had been spent among
homely, small things, and these gorgeous scenes overwhelmed her."
But more than heady discussions or mind-boggling exhibits. the fair was
about fun, and for that visitors went to the first midway ever. There they could
see everything from little Egypt doing her hoochie-coochie dance to the fair's
ultimate amusement: the Ferris wheel, a spinning Eiffel Tower and a revolving
skyscraper all in one. For 50 cents, one could ride two round-trips in 20 minutes
and rise to nearly 30 stories.
"The lights, the water, the mystic whiteness of the buildings. A sense of intense elevation
held me, an abiding wonder at so much beauty, a deep and exquisite contentment
at having seen it, so that one might say, at last! At last!"
[Explosions of fireworks}.