World's
Fairs (1853-1897):
A New Idea
How to
Study the World's Fairs
The history of the World's Fairs is a
fascinating topic that extends well beyond the story of amusement parks.
The time from when the first American world's fair appeared in
New York in 1851 to the last one in 1984 at New Orleans covers an
immense time period in U.S. history. Beyond our shores, world's fairs
were very influential with the countries that held them. In fact,
World's fairs are still alive and well today in Asia, with many planned
for the future. So the question is, how should we study this topic?
In their book Fair America, authors
Rydell, Findling, and Pelle discuss no less than six different academic
approaches to studying world's fairs. However, for purposes of this Web
site, I will focus on the specific and unique aspect of amusements at
these fairs. But I would be remiss in not at least mentioning some of
the historic events and contexts of the various fairs. So let us begin!
It
Started with the Crystal Palace
World's fairs began in 1851 with the
construction of the landmark Crystal Palace in London, England. The
purpose of the exposition was to celebrate the industrial achievement of
the nations of the world (of which Britain just so happened to be the
leader). A single large building (1848' by 408') was constructed by
greenhouse builder Joseph Paxton. This building actually resembled an
enormous greenhouse and was highly regarded by all, including Queen
Victoria. The fair itself was a great success with six million visitors
and a total profit of over £186 thousand. Some Americans had successful
exhibits during the London exposition. Cyrus McCormick's agricultural
reapers and Samuel Colt's revolver firearms where big hits. Many more
Americans made the trip across the Atlantic to see the event. After the fair closed, the
Crystal Palace was disassembled and moved to Sydenham and rebuilt. There
it remained until a fire in 1936 destroyed it.
A group of
businessmen decided to have their own exposition in New York City. They
acquired a parcel of land, next to the New York Public Library where
Bryant Park is now, to construct New York's own Crystal Palace. The
building opened three months late in July 1853 and, despite the public
appearance of President Franklin Pierce, attendance did not meet
expectations. Already in debt by $100,000 by 1854, the Association in
charge of running the facility approached P.T. Barnum to rescue
the venture. They had initially approached Barnum about running the
exposition but he initially declined. This time he agreed, but to no
avail. By July 1st of that year, he had resigned frustrated and
exhausted. The Crystal Palace close in November with $300,000 in debt.
In 1857, a fire broke out during a leased-out convention and burned the
building to the ground. Fortunately, all 2,000 people were able to
escape the building in time.
Obviously, the first foray into the
world's fair realm for the United States was a failure. Unfortunately,
it would only get worse for the young country. While world's fairs
continued to have success in European cities like London, Paris, and Vienna, America
would face the Civil War and the painful healing of Reconstruction.
A Second
Try: Philadelphia's Exhibition of 1876
The Industrial Revolution in the United States was in full swing during
the years following the Civil War. Businessmen (not women at this time -
remember that the Woman's Suffrage Movement was still developing at this
time) made a lot of money in establishing industries in the U.S.
These powerful leaders again looked to the success of world's fairs
overseas and their ability to build these nations and show off
industrial prowess and wealth. The financial panic of 1873 convinced
them that a world's fair in the U.S. was needed to assure the people
that their vision of the future was the correct one. This attitude
resulted in fairs that emphasized Anglo-Saxon superiority over other
races, which became a common theme among all the American world's
fairs leading up to World War I. What does this have to do with
amusement parks? The answer will come at Chicago's first world's fair.
The first world's fair after the New
York failure was the United States Centennial International Exhibition
held in Philadelphia in 1876. As you can probably guess from the
title and the date, the purported purpose of the exposition was to
celebrate America's 100th birthday. What the planners hoped was that
their displays of the U.S. agricultural and industrial progress would impress other nations
enough to stimulate foreign trade. The organizers of
the exposition obtained rights to Fairmont Park, which at 450 acres was
the largest urban park in the U.S. at the time. With such a large site,
designer Hermann J. Schwartzmann decided to use a multi-building layout
for the event. There were large buildings for the main exhibits, smaller
structures for U.S. states and foreign countries, and other small
buildings for restaurants, stores, and support facilities. This layout
would be adopted by all other world's fairs in the future. The fair
itself was a success in terms of attendance, about ten million visitors,
and a boost to foreign trade. One of the highlights was the display of
the Statue of Liberty's arm and torch. It would be nine years later
before she would be completed in New York's harbor. However, despite the
interest, the event still lost
money while independent business owners who set-up shop adjacent to Fairmont
Park and made a handsome profit.
A Concept
Tested: World's Fairs Around The Country
The success of the Philadelphia world's fair would inspire other
American cities to create and host such events over the next 108 years.
Visitors from the Southern states were particularly inspired and thought
that hosting fairs would help their recovery from the Civil War. In
1881, Atlanta held the International Cotton Exposition at
Oglethorp Park. The modestly sized, regional fair successfully showcased
agricultural equipment and machinery but still closed with a small
financial loss. In 1883, Louisville held the Southern Exposition,
which was also a regional scale fair. The event successfully promoted
Louisville as a transportation link between the North and the South and
became an annual event for the next four years.
The World's Industrial and Cotton
Centennial Exposition held in New Orleans in 1884-85, was on a
much bigger scale than its two Southern predecessors. The Main Building
alone could have housed the entire Atlanta exposition. The exposition
marked the 100th anniversary of the first shipment of cotton from the
U.S. to Europe. The fair featured the largest electric railway in the
United States. Its three-mile track encircled the fairgrounds. The planners had hoped the fair would stimulate the use
of New Orlean's port on the Mississippi River. But, due to its remote
location, construction delays, and other factors, the fair was a failure
with a net loss of close to $500 thousand (equivalent to over $9 million
today!). It would be another eight
years before the next world's fair would be held.
Thus far into this history,
amusements have not played a significant role. That would change with
the 1893 Columbian Exhibition held in Chicago, Illinois. These
planners wanted to continue the message set by Philadelphia and New
Orleans. However, they were also businessmen and need to ensure the fair
at least paid for itself. The solution was a dedicated amusement
concessions area called the
Midway Plaisance. This area was extremely profitable and started the
idea of an amusement park. In this era, the social elite frowned on
commercialism, so they categorized the Midway as part of the ethnology
department. However, Sol Bloom, who was charged with developing and
running this area, was more interested in money than promoting the
elitist's racial attitudes. He capitalized on the fascination (and ignorance) of
fair visitors with these exotic places by creating interesting exhibits.
The ethnic villages of the Midway stood in stark contrast to the imperial and
whitewashed structures at the rest of the fair. This fair is such a
pivotal point in the history of amusement parks that
I have created a separate page just for the
Columbian Exposition.
After the success at Chicago,
California leaders decided to hold the California Midwinter
International Exposition, starting in January 1894. The planners hoped
to raise awareness across the country of the region's temperate climate.
Many of the exhibits from Chicago were transported directly to the
Golden Gate Park site in San Francisco. The most symbolic
structure of the fair was a 266-foot tower with a searchlight. This
tower motif would be continued at other fairs and become a focal point
at Coney Island's Luna Park. The fair was a success as it brought 1.4
million visitors and a made a modest profit. Some of the imported
attractions included the Streets of Cairo, Japanese Village, and an
Eskimo habitat. While Ferris's wheel had a different destination,
designer J. K. Firth built his own version of the wheel. Dante's Inferno,
which featured a large dragon head as an entrance allowed guests to see
burning lakes, dancing skeletons and other illusions.
Amusement
Parks Take Form
With the exception of New Orleans, the world's fair concept was a hit
with U.S. cities. The fairs appeared with regularity around country
until the interruption of World War I. We pause at this time in history
because the year is 1895. Paul Boyton is building his Sea Lion Park at
Coney Island, Fredrick Thompson is about to discover a successful career
creating attractions, and Thompson and Skip Dundy are about to meet and
form a very equitable partnership.
The Cotton States & International
Exposition held in Atlanta in 1895 continued the theme from San
Francisco. The goal of this exposition was to foster trade between
Southern states and South America. The midway, called the Terraces, featured the now
traditional ethnic villages (Japanese, Eskimos, American Indians, etc.)
and a Ferris wheel called the Phoenix Wheel. The exposition did not
attract the expected number of attendees and ended with a significant
fiscal loss. The city purchased the site and converted it to Piedmont
Park.
Despite the struggles of the Georgian
capital, Tennessee decided to hold its own world's fair to celebrate the
100th anniversary of statehood in 1896. The exposition, held at West
Side Park in Nashville, TN, was also to showcase the New South
from antebellum to industrialized. Due to funding problems, the
exposition did not open until 1897. The midway, dubbed Vanity Fair,
featured ethnic villages, such as the Streets of Cairo, a
Shoot-the-Chutes, and a Giant See-Saw where two large carriages
alternated being raised 150 feet into the air. Nashville was the first
city to have its exposition attend by President McKinley.
Conclusion
At the close of the 19th Century, world's fairs had been proven to boost
local economies and to, at least in part, help convey the message of the
planners. The fact that such events were planned with much backing from
the private sector meant that the financial bottom line could not be
ignored. It took the early entrepreneurs to demonstrate that Americans
would pay to be entertained and were eager to be involved in a variety
of experiences. These fairs would continue to be held during most of the
20th Century. However, at our current point in history, the U.S. is
about to enter a war that will change the character of the nation.
The
next world's fairs would wrestle with this new concept of an imperial
America.
U.S.
World's Fairs
Location |
Year(s) |
Highlights |
New York |
1853-54 |
First US
world's fair, Crystal Palace, failure! |
Philadelphia |
1876 |
First US
multi-building fair |
New Orleans |
1884 |
First
major Southern fair, failure! |
Chicago |
1893 |
Creation
of the Midway, Ferris wheel, ethnic villages |
San Francisco |
1894 |
First West
Coast fair, exhibits from Chicago fair |
Atlanta |
1895 |
|
Nashville |
1897 |
Thompson's
first attractions |
Spanish - American War (Feb - Dec 1898) |
Omaha |
1898 |
Thompson
and Dundy meet |
Buffalo |
1901 |
Thompson
and Dundy join forces |
Charleston |
1901-02 |
|
Saint Louis |
1904 |
|
Hampton Roads |
1907 |
|
Seattle |
1909 |
|
San Francisco |
1915 |
|
San Diego |
1915-16 |
|
U.S. Fights World War I (Apr 1917 - Nov 1918) |
Philadelphia |
1926 |
|
Chicago |
1933-34 |
|
San Diego |
1935 |
|
Cleveland |
1936 |
|
Dallas |
1936 |
|
California |
1939 |
|
New York |
1939 |
|
San Francisco |
1940 |
|
U.S. Fights World War II (Dec 1941 - Sep 1945) |
Seattle |
1962 |
|
New York |
1964-65 |
Disney
creates four popular attractions |
San Antonio |
1968 |
|
Spokane |
1974 |
|
Knoxville |
1982 |
|
New Orleans |
1984 |
|
Location |
Attendance |
Operation |
London |
|
01 May 1851 - 11 Oct
1851 |
Paris |
5,162,330 |
15 May 1855 - 15 Nov
1855 |
Paris |
15,000,000 |
01 Apr 1867 - 31 Oct
1867 |
Vienna |
|
01 May 1873 - 01 Nov
1873 |
Philadelphia |
10,000,000 |
10 May 1876 - 10 Nov
1876 |
Paris |
16,156,626 |
05 May 1878 - 10 Nov
1878 |
New Orleans |
|
1884 |
Antwerp, Belgium |
|
1885 |
London |
|
1886 |
Glasgow, Scotland |
|
1888 |
Melbourne, Australia |
|
1888 |
Paris |
|
1889 |
Chicago |
|
1893 |
San Francisco |
|
1894 |
Atlanta |
|
1895 |
Brussels, Belgium |
|
1897 |
Paris |
|
1900 |
Buffalo |
|
1901 |
Saint Louis |
|
1904 |
Liege, Belgium |
|
1905 |
Milan, Italy |
|
1906 |
Dublin, Ireland |
|
1907 |
Hampton Roads |
|
1907 |
Seattle |
|
1909 |
Brussels |
|
1910 |
Turin, Italy |
|
1911 |
Ghent, Belgium |
|
1913 |
San Francisco |
|
1915 |
San Diego |
|
1915-16 |
Rio de Janiero |
|
1922-23 |
Wembly, UK |
|
1924-25 |
Paris |
|
1925 |
Philadelphia |
|
1926 |
Barcelona, Spain |
|
1929 |
Seville, Spain |
|
1930 |
Anwerp, Belgium |
|
1930 |
Liege, Belgium |
|
1930 |
Paris |
|
1931 |
Chicago |
|
1933-34 |
Brussels |
|
1935 |
Paris |
|
1937 |
New York |
|
1939 |
San Francisco |
|
1940 |
Brussels |
|
1958 |
Seattle |
|
1962 |
New York |
|
1964-65 |
Montreal |
|
1967 |
San Antonio |
|
1968 |
Osaka, Japan |
|
1970 |
Spokane |
|
1974 |
Okinawa, Japan |
|
1975 |
Knoxville |
|
1982 |
New Orleans |
|
1984 |
Tsukuba, Japan |
|
1985 |
Vancouver |
|
1986 |
Brisbane, Australia |
|
1988 |
Seville, Spain |
|
1992 |
Genoa, Italy |
|
1992 |
Taejon, South Korea |
|
1993 |
Lisbon, Portugal |
|
1998 |
Hanover, Germany |
|
2000 |
Aichi Prefecture,
Japan |
|
2005 |
Zaragoza, Spain |
|
2008 |
Shanghai, China |
|
2010 |
|
|
|
Source:
http://expomuseum.com
|