Introduction
When the World’s Columbian Exhibition officially opened in
Chicago on May 1, 1893, the fair was not quite ready for public visitors. An
impossibly harsh winter meant that construction was far behind schedule and
several buildings were unfinished. Further, the immense size of the fairgrounds
meant that cleaning up the property and surrounding landscape was no easy task.
However, visitors knew that Burnham and his team had been hard at work for many
months on the fair, and they were sympathetic to their efforts to accomplish a feat as glorious as the White City. Thus, reporters at the
time maintained a careful balance
between respectful criticism of the fair’s unfinished state and praise for the
momentous grandeur and potential beauty of what was to be.
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| Front Page of Chicago Daily Tribune on Opening Day |
Incomplete Condition
of the Fair
Interestingly, most of the articles that came out on opening
day of the World’s Columbian Exposition do not discuss the beauty of the White
City, nor do they extoll the monumental design of the fair. This was probably because on May 1,
1893, the majority of the fair was incomplete. Many of the pavilions were not
finished with construction, and the fairgrounds were littered with trash and
debris.
 |
| Map Published Alongside Article in Scientific American OPENING OF THE WORLD'S COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION, CHICAGO, MAY 1, 1893. (1893, May 06). Scientific American (1845-1908), LXVIII., 274. |
As reporters wrote about the opening day of the fair, nearly
every major newspaper commented on the incomplete state of the fairgrounds. On
May 1, 1893, the Chicago Tribute reported that “the public will find the fair
still in a somewhat incomplete condition.”[1] Similarly, The New York Times and the Boston Globe mentioned the unfinished nature of the fairgrounds. However,
these reporters were generally pretty sensitive to the hard work of Burnham and
his team, and were reluctant to blame the fair’s designers for its lack of
readiness. The same article in The Tribune continues, the incomplete nature of the fair is“due more
to the tardiness of exhibitors than to any lack of zeal on the part of the
management of the exhibition.”[2]
In fact, most newspapers made effort to praise the hard work
of the workers and designers despite the unfinished nature of the fair upon
opening day. On opening day, the Boston Globe reported: “no praise could be too
great for the honest workers who have devoted time, thought, personal nerve and
individual industry to the attainment of the desired by hopeless end.”[3]
Similarly, on May 1, 1893, the New York Times made sure to
report that despite the unruly appearance of the fair, it was no fault of the
fair’s overseers. Their article reads “all the heads of departments were at
their desks from morning till night and some of them will not leave the grounds
until early in the morning.”[4]
Weather
It seemed that rather than condone the efforts of the fair
workers, newspapers were more apt to place the blame of the fair’s unfinished
appearance on the terrible weather conditions leading up to opening day. On their report of the opening day of the Exposition, nearly
every major newspaper mentioned the difficulty that the weather had posed in
the construction and completion of the fairgrounds.
 |
| Headline from Boston's Daily Globe on May 1, 1893 |
The Boston Globe’ s headline read: “World’s Fair Will Open
in the Storm or Sunshine.”[5]
While the New York Times proclaimed: “The Opening Services To-Day Rain or
Shine.”[6]
The weather was described in extreme and graphic detail. “It was raining in
torrents and blowing a gale from the northeast…this morning,” one reporter wrote.[7] Another
described the “varying degrees of must, deluge, bluster and zephyristic wave.”[8]
These intense descriptions of the terrible weather seemed to
serve as excuses for the unfinished condition of the fair itself. “Providence was against them,” and it was
only by their own sheer will power and skill that the fair workers were able to
get the fairgrounds ready for opening day.[9]
Even General Davis, one of the chiefs of the fair, is quoted
blaming conditions out of his control for the problems surrounding opening day.
In an article from the New York Times he says, “we have been delayed by the
unprecedentedly bad weather, by labor troubles, by tardy exhibitors, and by a
thousand and one things that were unforeseen and could not be guarded against,
but after all we have pulled through satisfactorily.” If only it does not rain
to-morrow, we shall all be perfectly happy.”[10]
In pitching opening day as a struggle between the fair
workers and the rough elements of nature, which God was deliberately thrusting
upon the fair in order to prohibit the fair’s opening, these reporters created
a melodramatic news story out of what was in reality, poor planning on the part
of the fair architects and a few bad days of rain.
 |
| Illustration from the Los Angeles Times |
The reporters may have been reluctant to blame the fair’s
organizers for the unfinished nature of the fair in order to maintain a sense
of national pride in the Exposition. Reports of opening day would be read all
around the world, and every major city, from New York to Boston, wanted to
portray America as capable of organizing and staging a fair as great as the
nations that had done so before.
Most articles end with a distant hope that conditions will
improve in the future, fixating again on the excuses for delays rather than on
the fair itself. The New York Times concludes its article by turning again to trivial issues of weather and also hope for better conditions in the future “the local weather officer predicts fair weather for this
vincinity tomorrow and every one hopes he is right in his guess.”[11]
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