Saturday, September 13, 2003


World’s Fairs and Expos


The Internet enables many different types of obsessions. Some of them are even healthy, or at least harmless. Perhaps the most rewarding of these is the ability to “drill down” into some field of knowledge of which you have only the slightest pre-existing familiarity. I went on one of those adventures this evening, and just for kicks I’ll share a bit of what I found. Today I learned about World’s Fairs.

Every obsession (even the minor ones, like this) has its genesis, and the trigger this time was the book The Devil in the White City, by Erik Larson. I borrowed it from the library a few weeks ago and have been reading it on my ride to work. It combines a history of the 1893 World’s Colombian Exposition (otherwise known as the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair) with the story of Henry Holmes, perhaps the first American serial killer. It details the struggle to get the fair, mammoth in size, built in time for its opening. Unfortunately, there are scant few photos in the book, so I went looking online.

I found a site that does a pretty good job of summarizing the history of the 1893 fair, put together by Julie Rose. I still wanted to see more pictures, though.

I found lots of photos at Corbis, which has ump-diddy-billion pictures of everything. They’re not free to reproduce, but you can browse thumbnails till the cows come home, if you like. Do a search on “World’s Fair” — there’s some really wonderful pics from various fairs, going all the way back to the New York fair in 1850.

The photos of the various 20th century fairs are great, too, particularly the ones from the 30s through the 60s. They’re dripping with retrofuturism, all polished aluminum surfaces and “electricity will save us” Jetsons-osity. A great example is the amazing Atomium, from Expo ‘58, held in Brussels, Belgium.

Did you know that there’s an official body that sanctions World’s Fairs? Well there is: the BIE. (official [Flash-y] website) Did you know that the next one is to be called Expo 2005, and is going to be held in Aichi Prefecture, Japan? The mascots are Kiccoro (Forest Child) and Morizo (Forest Grand Father.)

What the hell — maybe I’ll go.

edit: 4-March-2004
An unadbridged audiobook version of The Devil in the White City is available from Audible.com, and can be purchased from the iTunes music store through here.


:: Dave Walker 02:22 (EST/EDT) [+] ::

:: [/entertainment/books]
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:: Comments (2)

Comments:

ssp wrote:

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Response:
Don't forget 1889 (?) which gave us the Eiffel tower. And, perhaps less significantly, Expo 2000 in Hannover, the only Expo I've been to so far. They even had their own Kraftwerk song for the occasion.
d.w. wrote:

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Response:
Ah yes, they talked a bit about the 1889 fair in the book. The Paris fair apparently had quite an impact, and its success was the inspiration for mounting the 1893 fair. The original Ferris Wheel was the Chicago fair's attempt to top the Eiffel Tower.



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