by Mim E. Rivas
The rest of his fellow committee members were stunned into silence, with one exception, a gentleman who simply murmured, “I’ll be damned.”
Lewis and Thomas built on the vision of the Parthenon, promoting Nashville as the “Athens of the South” and strewing likenesses of the goddess Athena and her Olympian relatives into statuary, fountains, bridges, and cornices across the exposition grounds. The Centennial’s definitive poster showed an Athenian “Lady Tennessee” as she rose up “out of the ashes of the War between the States and the Reconstruction period, leading the New South into the next century.”
To validate their claims, the planning committee members chose to make the presence and participation of African-Americans a top priority. They put significant resources toward erecting a Negro Building and creating a departmental committee composed of the most respected Tennesseans of color. This was the capacity in which Dr. William Key was invited to participate in the Centennial and to attend the March ceremony that marked the laying of the cornerstone of the Negro Building.
Together with such revered individuals as the Reverend R. B. Vanderfil, Bishop M. P. Saltier, and Dr. W. A. Hadley, among a dozen others, William Key had been asked to preside on the Executive Committee of the Negro Department, and also to serve as chairman of the Livestock Committee, the only member of the Executive Committee to have a dual role. It gave him immense joy to reunite with colleagues and friends and to share the first sight of what would be a strikingly elegant, expansive three-story building. Designed in the style of the Spanish Renaissance, to be finished in white staff, the building was to have an interior capacity to include eighty-five exhibits and to accommodate a rooftop restaurant pavilion with lofty vistas.
The speeches by Centennial officials to an auditorium full of an astounding ten thousand spectators, mostly African-American, were incredibly rousing, but none more so than a piece of oratorical sleight of hand delivered by Professor William H. Council, former slave and founding president of the Agricultural and Mechanical College for Negroes in Normal, Alabama. For ten spellbinding minutes, Professor Council gave a speech so majestically eloquent that few detected his departure from the Booker T. Washington’s Atlanta Compromise of “separate but equal” and his rebuke to those who referred to racial concerns as the “Negro problem.”
Professor Council first acknowledged, “These occasions mark the evolution of Southern thought and industry, and the result of the self-directed energy of the Negro.” Finished with stereotypes and backlash, he then thundered, “Here on this spot the world may see the other side of the Negro life than ‘Sam Johnson, the chicken thief.’ Here it may see the beautiful buds of Negro handicraft, Negro art, science, literature, invention. Here the world may see the hitherfore giant energies of a mighty people waking into a conscious activity.”
Dr. Key was among those applauding madly and then listening breathlessly when Council added, “I challenge the annals of man to present so beautiful a spectacle.”
Professor Council praised Nashville and Tennessee for the opportunities to put on display what “we have accomplished in our three hundred years struggle…right here in the Egypt of our bondage,” continuing to assert that “only as we recede from Appomattox…only as memories of former hates shall have drowned in the Red Sea of brotherly love, and the good things we have done for each other come like angels in conscious view, will the old master and the old slave know what helps they have been to each other. We must love. We can not afford to hate.”
But what of the Negro problem? Council challenged it, pointing out, “There still remains the Caucasian problem. In view of what the Negro has done for this country, in view of what the white man has done for the Negro, will the white man continue and enlarge the work of encouragement in the struggling race; or will he use the shotgun instead of the Holy Bible; the bloody knife instead of the spelling-book?” In the speaker’s opinion economic equality was paramount, not only to elevate the person of color, but also to elevate tolerance and to “make the South a new earth.”
What Council said about tolerance and forgiveness between former slaves and masters resonated with Dr. Key, as did Council’s emphasis on black education. Indeed, he was so impressed with Professor Council that after the speech was over, he introduced himself and began the process that would enroll Maggie Davis at A&M in Normal, Alabama. But the words that most moved him came at the end, when Council spoke of the hope for the next generation:
Teach the Negro boy the sacredness of human life; teach him that man must be as precious in the sight of man as he is in the sight of God. Teach him that the transmission of a disregard for the law is the transmission of the spirit of the mob, the spirit of riot, the spirit of hate…. Teach him that he belongs to a glorious race, which stands before God with its hands unstained in human blood. Teach him to honor and revere this record…. Teach him that it is better to be persecuted than to persecute…. Teach him that the man who hates him on account of his color is far beneath him, but the man who hates his condition and strives to lift him up may be his superior…. Teach him that man, that race, is superior which does superior things to lift mankind to superior conditions.
Except for the fact that Jim Key was not able to witness the speeches and the dedication ceremony that followed, the events of March 13, 1897, had given Dr. Key one of the most gratifying days of his life.
Albert Rogers had meant to visit the Negro Building on plenty of occasions, including the March dedication ceremony, but other preoccupations intervened. Much of his time was spent installing the Old Plantation as part of the Agricultural Building’s exhibit and Shoot the Chutes in the amusement area known as Vanity Fair.
When the Exposition opened on May 1, 1897, the Nashville American depicted Vanity Fair’s vibrant atmosphere by writing, “Here are gathered together from the far corners of the earth people representing nearly every race and nationality who with their continuous babel of unknown languages and their queer and quaint costumes present a Kaleidoscope panorama ever intensely interesting to the Centennial visitor.”
Rogers felt instantly at home. By summer’s end he had been so industrious that he became the booking agent for an additional handful of concessions such as the Mirror Maze (a fun house that evolved into a staple of carnivals and amusement parks) and the Edison Mirage, a popular attraction that offered choices of four different motion pictures in its Electric Scenic Theatre, which sat the audience on a revolving disc as it turned around a series of screens. All of a sudden, A. R. Rogers had attained a first-rate reputation as a promoter. In this short time, he proved to have a knack for handling the intricate logistics of transporting and installing attractions, and he seemed to have an arsenal of innovative techniques for generating publicity and revenue for the concessions he represented.
The Chutes—an early hybrid of roller coaster and water slide—sent boats on tracks shooting down from a high, steep incline and plunging into the lake below, splashing plumes of spray onto the crowds gathered around the water’s edge. Rogers cleverly positioned the Chutes at the highest point of the Exposition and only charged a ten-cent admission, thus outselling the ride’s biggest competition, the Giant Seesaw—a steel latticed seesaw developed by a Nashville company that had cages carrying groups of riders on each end rising at full tilt to 208 feet in the air.
Shooting the Chutes had the advantage of being less frightening for most ages and it rarely experienced any operational problems, except for an incident that involved a woman politely said to be quite stout. When her boat hit the water, its impact—amplified by her girth—forced the bottom of the boat to fall out. Thrashing and screaming that she could not swim, the woman suddenly stopped her hysteria after discovering that the lake was only thirty inches deep. She pulled herself erect, came to her feet, calmly smoothed out her very wet attire, and with as much dignity as she could muster, walked to the platform at the water’s edge and was helped to dry land.
Albert Rogers teased the press with the story, succ
essfully increasing admissions sold for the Chutes. He may have done the same to help promote an exhibit of the birthplace cabins of two famous Kentuckians, Abraham Lincoln, President of the Union, and Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederacy. A rumor spread that somehow the logs from the disassembled cabins had been mixed up during shipment, an apparent scandal that only caused more fairgoers to visit the attraction.
Besides tending to his many responsibilities, whenever Albert attempted to visit other destinations at the Centennial (except for stopping over to the Old Plantation to admire his thriving cotton patch), it seemed that the Vanity Fair had so much else to occupy and entertain his free hours. There were the gondolas to be ridden, a flight up in the sky for several hundred feet in Barnard’s Airship, the nearly naked belly-dancing coochee-coochee girls of the Streets of Cairo, Italian immersion at the Blue Grotto (modeled after the Isle of Capri), rides on camels named Alibaba and Yankee Doodle, sword-playing tumblers, clowns on stilts, magicians, the Cuban and Chinese villages, the Moorish Palace, the Café of Night and Morning, inspired by Dante’s Inferno (where restaurant tables were made from coffins), and food and drink to be sampled from a dozen different ethnic cuisines.
Doc Key looked forward to visiting Vanity Fair but was likewise occupied by his official duties at the Negro Building and with the increasing number of daily shows that he and Jim Key were offering there. By early June, much of Shelbyville—traveling by rail, buggy, on horses and mules—had come up at least once to visit their hometown stars and enjoy the Centennial. For many Bedford countians, it was the most memorable experience of their lives, endowing them with the treasure of stories and souvenirs they passed down to their descendants. For these families, Jim Key became synonymous with the 1897 Nashville World’s Fair.
The tall, dark, handsome, educated bay—on exhibit at the Negro Building—was apparently the draw that brought in a crush of crowds who wouldn’t have otherwise come into the Negro Building. The Centennial’s Official History later asserted that “Dr. Key’s educated horse, ‘Jim’, whose wonderful intelligence greatly amused and interested thousands of visitors to the Exposition,” was in fact a leading draw of the entire Centennial.
As Lucinda Key had predicted, William and Jim had risen to a higher calling, first by advancing interest in the accomplishments of African-Americans. Now Doc Key wasted no opportunity to incorporate his humane themes into their demonstrations, always pointing to the use of kindness and patience as his educational secret.
Though the Centennial planners were profoundly pleased with the success of the Negro Department, when the Committee of Arrangements undertook to create an itinerary for the visit of President William McKinley on June 11 and 12, they did not put the Negro Building on his official schedule. It was left as a question mark for the end of the second day, scheduling and interest pending.
The planning for McKinley’s presence in Nashville had ruffled feathers on both sides of the Mason-Dixon, primarily because the President had declined to preside over the May 1 Opening Day ceremonies in Tennessee. This was despite numerous written invitations and urgings and a committee of leading Tennesseans who traveled to Washington to meet with President McKinley in person. The envoys were politely turned down with the excuse that the President could not cancel previous engagements. Much of Nashville bristled at the slight but by Opening Day had only words of praise for the President for performing the now standard ritual of holding a White House ceremony. There he pressed a button that sent an electrical relay through Virginia into North Carolina and across Tennessee to Nashville, triggering the works of a cannon that fired a signal that unleashed the engines and opened the gates to the Exposition.
There was a feeling in some Nashville circles that a Southern-hosted world’s fair had not earned the full endorsement of the Ohio-born McKinley—who had, after all, fought as a major for the Union during the Civil War, before serving as an Ohio Republican congressman for fourteen years in the House of Representatives and a term as governor of Ohio. Then another date was proposed by Asa Bushnell, the man who had succeeded McKinley as Ohio’s governor, that the President visit Nashville on June 11 for the celebration of Ohio Day and that June 12 be assigned as Cincinnati Day, in order that two full days of events could be scheduled.
Once it was announced that President and Mrs. McKinley had accepted the invitation, the Centennial planners threw off their prior disenchantment and began preparations in earnest. The authors of the Official History recorded the city’s buzz of excitement, which built for weeks in anticipation of the President’s arrival, “not alone because of his high office but also out of regard for his distinguished abilities and his untarnished personal character.” Political and geographic differences notwithstanding, the South—with Nashville as its designated representative—was eager to take William McKinley into her bosom. Compared with the elitist ranks growing up North, said area journalists, McKinley was personified by quiet dignity and a friendly manner and was, in sum, an accomplished, noble, yet still typical American.
William McKinley, Tennesseans concluded, was a regular guy. With his commoner’s fleshy features, finished by a manly cleft chin, and heavy knit eyebrows, he even looked like a regular guy. Better still, in the opinion of most Southerners, he was a gentleman in view of his devotion to the First Lady. Ida McKinley was a lovely but frail china doll who suffered horribly from fainting spells and crippling attacks. Nonetheless, she was rarely absent from her husband’s side at important White House events—often seated in a chair for receiving lines and usually holding a nosegay to hide her trembling hands.
To show Nashville’s gratitude to her and the President, tens of thousands of citizens poured into the streets for the procession to the Centennial on the morning of Friday, June 11.
Up until this date, the weather in Nashville had been custom-made for the World’s Fair. Spring in Middle Tennessee bloomed with a lush excess of color in gardens, lawns, fields, rivers, and woods, setting off Nashville and the Centennial like jewels. Skies were so sunny and almost cloudlessly blue, with the usual humidity so low, that the chairs of the Committees of Arrangements and Receptions congratulated one another for weather that could not have been more ideal for the Centennial and the President’s arrival. But in partisan fashion, by the dawn of that Friday, the mercury rebelled, sending the temperature spiking up to an intense level, the humidity wilting the landscape into an impressionistic steamy blur. In the plucky spirit of the Volunteer State, however, as the Official History’s authors observed, “Everyone appreciated this was beyond the control of the Committee of Arrangements, and the inevitable was therefore accepted with amiable resignation.”
Traveling with a retinue of forty correspondents from every major newspaper in the country, the McKinleys’ party had left Washington at noon on June 9 by special train over the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, accompanied as well by an entourage of cabinet members, Washington dignitaries, families, and staffs, and arrived in heat-laden Nashville on the L&N, pulling into the depot on time at 7:55 A.M. A receiving party of two hundred delivered the President and his companions to the regal Maxwell House. By ten o’clock, President McKinley was waiting in the elegant parlor of the Maxwell where he welcomed his cohonorees, Tennessee’s governor Robert L. Taylor and Ohio’s governor Asa Bushnell, along with a brigade of prominent Ohioans, among them the mayors of Cincinnati and Cleveland.
The procession of eighteen carriages and as many tallyhos for staffs and press—the President and Mrs. McKinley in the lead carriage—was thronged by ever more mounted police and military officers as it forged through Church Street to Vine and then moved onto Broad Street, past the Custom House out toward Vanderbilt University. On the streets a surging mass of humanity bestowed on President McKinley one continuous ovation.
At the Centennial grounds, the vast Exposition Auditorium was already filled to overflowing, and when the thousands inside heard the shots of the cannon announcing that the President had passed through the gates, they stoo
d and roared their cheer of welcome, raising their fervor and volume as a waving President William McKinley strode down the aisles to the belfry chimes of “America.” The jubilation was not marred by the absence of Mrs. McKinley—who had been escorted to private quarters to rest—since much of the public knew she was no doubt taxed by the heat, the excitement of the morning, and the exhaustion of her journey.
Toward the end of several speeches praising Nashville, Ohio senator W. T. Clarke declared that the Tennessee Centennial had surpassed every other world’s fair to date. “Philadelphia, the pioneer of the exposition work,” Clarke said of the 1876 World’s Fair and true marker of one hundred years of nationhood, “did fairly well.” He wasn’t so kind about the 1893 Columbian Exposition, saying that “the World’s Fair in Chicago, upon governmental crutches, stood nearly upright.” The 1894 California Mid-Winter Exposition in San Francisco had been a good start for the West. “But Nashville indeed has done herself proud, and is the morning star, heralding the sunrise of a higher, better, and nobler civilization.”
Senator Clarke bowed to his fellow Ohioans, to the President, to the three cabinet members, and to the numerous out-of-towners, commending all the cities of their origins before he went on to marvel at Nashville as a capital of learning,
having the largest scholastic population in any city in the country; four female seminaries; three colleges for the education of the colored people, including Fisk University, the singers of which have established a worldwide reputation. Vanderbilt University, with her endowment of over a million dollars, three medical schools, three schools of pharmacy, two law schools, three large dental schools, the largest in the United States, and a complete common system for white and black, with her population increasing in the last quarter of a century fifty percent.