8. ELECTRICAL BUILDING
The World’s Columbian Exposition was the world’s first electric fair and the Electrical Building was the first ever devoted to demonstrating the “mysteries and wonders and the benefits and capabilities of electricity.” According to the official 1893 guidebook, “Here were located the most novel and brilliant exhibits of the Exposition.” Electricity was a new industry and elicited much public curiosity and excitement. At the entrance to the building stood a large statue of the early explorer of electricity, Benjamin Franklin, with his kite “as he wrested from the clouds the secrets of their lightnings” (Truman 1893). The manifold benefits of electricity were displayed in the Electrical Building and throughout the fairgrounds. There were several electricity power plants within the fairgrounds. The Machinery Hall had a gigantic Westinghouse electricity-generating plant. The Edison, Thomson-Houston, Fort Wayne, and Western Electric companies had their own power plants, as did the German Siemens-Halske company. The oil that was burned in the large turbines to generate the electricity for the Fair flowed in underground pipes from the Lima, Ohio, refineries of the Standard Oil Company. The buildings and pathways were lit up by 8,000 arc lamps and 130,000 incandescent lamps. The Intramural Railway linking the various exhibition halls was powered by electricity. The profusion of electric light, the electric fountains, and the searchlights playing in the sky all delighted the crowds who watched the nightly spectacle with wide-eyed astonishment and periodic bursts of applause.
The architectural firm of Van Brunt & Howe designed the Electrical Building in the Spanish renaissance style.10 The Electrical Building stood 700 feet long and 345 feet wide. France and Germany dominated the science of electricity but, by 1893, the United States was the rising star. Electrical power helped make America the leading economy of the world. After viewing the exhibit H. H. Bancroft (1893) wrote: “No nation has displayed such aptness and ingenuity in adapting electricity to practical use.”
This fanciful artist’s rendition of the World’s Columbian Exposition was prepared for the Clark’s Spool Cotton Company of Scotland and Newark, New Jersey. Their trademark O.N.T. stood for “Our New Thread.” The drawing shows the mammoth Manufactures Building in the center. The body of water to the left is the Grand Basin, with MacMonnies’ Columbian Fountain at one end and the Statue of the Republic at the other end, closer to the lake. The domed structure facing the Basin is the Administration Building. The Agriculture Building and the Machinery Building are along the south shore of the Basin. The tower in the harbor at the end of the pier was planned but never built.
Ayer’s Sarsaparilla was introduced in 1859 by James Cook Ayer of Lowell, Massachusetts, one of the leading patent medicine makers. Ayer used his wealth to buy the American Woolen Company.
This trade card issued by the Columbus Buggy Company shows Christopher Columbus on his return to Spain as he demonstrates to the king and queen some of the wonders of the New World, including a buggy from Columbus. The Columbus Buggy Company was one of the largest in America, with 800 workers. One of its salesmen was Harvey S. Firestone, who believed that rubber tires would provide a more comfortable ride than steel. He later formed the Firestone Tire & Rubber Company and grew wealthy selling tires to Henry Ford.
Cadwallader C. Washburn founded the Minneapolis Milling Company in 1856 and 20 years later formed a partnership with John Crosby. Washburn & Crosby won a medal at the Fair and henceforth labeled their product Gold Medal. In 1928 Washburn-Crosby joined with 26 other Midwestern companies to form General Mills corporation.
This W. F. McLaughlin Coffee Company trade card showing aged veterans decorating the graves of their fallen Civil War brethren was distributed at the Fair. The card shows Major General John McAllister Schofield, who later served as secretary of war (1868–1869) and as commanding general of the U. S. Army (1888–1895).
The Chicago Corset Company was established in Aurora, Illinois, late in the 19th century. It was one of many American corset companies catering to the fashionable pinched-waist look.
The Melville Clark Company was one of many piano makers in Chicago. As sales of pianos declined, Melville Clark shifted to the mechanical piano player (also called pianola), using piano rolls. In 1919 it was bought by the Wurlitzer Company of Cincinnati.
The W. F. McLaughlin Coffee Company was established on La Salle Street in Chicago in 1852. For the Fair the company issued a series of trade cards. This card shows the Court of Honor lit up by fireworks on the Fourth of July. The MacMonnies Fountain is in the foreground and the Statue of the Republic and Triumphal Arch are in the center background. In 1926, the company founder’s son Frederic McLaughlin brought the Black Hawks ice hockey team to Chicago.
Prudential was one of many insurance companies seeking business at the Fair.
The Administration Building, designed by Richard Morris Hunt, was used in this advertisement for the California Fig Syrup Company of Louisville and New York. Syrup of figs was sold as a laxative and as a treatment for kidney, liver, and stomach problems.
The Waterbury Watch Company of Connecticut, founded in 1880, specialized in low-cost but reliable time pieces. In 1898 the company failed and was reorganized as the New England Watch Company.
Cottolene was a cooking fat derived from cotton seed. N. K. Fairbank & Company developed a large market for its product until margarine and other butter substitutes gained in popularity. Huey Pierce Long of Louisiana started his career as a Cottolene salesman.
The Singer Manufacturing Company was the largest of the dozens of sewing machine companies with exhibits at the Fair.
Singer issued a series of trade cards depicting people from around the world dressed in their national costumes, proudly made on Singer sewing machines.
Florence, near Northampton, Massachusetts, produced silk. Silk and cotton spool thread followed the sewing machine into homes and factories.
National Cash Register was founded in Dayton, Ohio, by John. H. Patterson. The early registers used finger-power to depress the keys. In 1906, the machines were powered by electricity. By the 1950s electronics were added and by the 1970s computerized registers were equipped to read bar codes and analyze data.
The Magee Furnace Company of Boston was but one of hundreds across the United States making kitchen ranges and parlor stoves. Early in the 20th century, electricity and gas replaced coal and wood as the preferred fuel for stoves and ranges.
The Ironclad Company made enameled ironware for use in the kitchen. The company went out of business in 1911.
The Empire Company of Auburn, New York, used the figure of Uncle Sam to show how much time and money could be saved by using its wringer. In the 1890s hand-cranked washing machines and wringers were standard, adding to the labor of keeping house before the convenience of power tools.
Royal Worcester was one of the largest American corset makers. In the 1890s, 2,000 workers in Worcester, Massachusetts were kept busy making corsets for the fashionable set.
The Heinz pickle pin was first issued as an advertising gimmick at the 1893 Fair. The H. J. Heinz Company of Pittsburgh gave out millions of these pins at Chicago and other fairs.
Franz Stollwerck of Cologne, Germany started his factory in 1839. The company’s Germania statue at the Fair was sculpted from 30,000 pounds of chocolate and stood 38 feet high.
Belcher & Taylor of Chicopee, Massachusetts, was another eastern plow company. This trade card was prepared by the Milton Bradley Company, lithographers, from nearby Springfield.
The Warder, Bushnell & Glessner Company of Springfield, Ohio, also built harvester machinery. Note the cutting blade that could be raised to avoid trees. In 1901, the company joined with McCormick and others to form International Harvester Corporation.
Gustavus Swift was a butcher in Sandwich, Massachusetts, before he moved to Boston and made his way to Chicago. Swift & Company initially carried live cattle to markets in the East before getting into the meat-cutting business. Using refrigerated cars, Swift & Company built a la
rge business carrying meat and meat by-products to markets across the nation and abroad.
Jersey Butterine was one of the many products made by Swift & Company.
Windmills were essential in the dry western Plains. B. S. Williams of Kalamazoo was one of dozens of windmill companies. This one supplied water to a house, barn, and reservoir.
Nelson Morris & Company was one of Chicago’s largest meat packers. In the early 20th century, Nelson Morris diversified and opened slaughterhouses and meat plants in other cities. At the end of the 1910s, it merged with Philip Armour’s company.
By 1893, corporations were fast replacing family farms. This American Cereal Company card shows several men and horse-powered harvesting machines working on a corporate farm, some of which spread across 30,000 acres.
Another American Cereal Company card shows a cumbersome tractor, using steam power transmitted by leather belting, to work a threshing machine.
The Quaker Oats steam engine pulls many freight cars laden with grains across the Rocky Mountains to the mills in this American Cereal Company card.
Quaker Oats introduced the two-pound cereal package. This card shows the company’s packing room c. 1890, with mainly women workers.
The New Orleans Brewing Association was formed by several small brewers. Breweries opened across America but Milwaukee and St. Louis dominated the beer market.
The Buckeye Company of Springfield, Ohio, built incubators for use on the farm.
Before electricity, the kerosene lantern was used in homes for reading and as a signal on the railroads.
Eclectric Oil, “for internal or external use.” The fascination with electricity made the word (or similar-looking derivitaves) useful for advertising even unrelated products.
Boston-based Hub Gore Makers used an electric-powered talking model of Uncle Sam to extol the virtues of its product—a water-repellent, elastic cloth that attached to shoes to cover the ankles. Note the interest from the British “John Bull” and other foreign customers.
This striking Western Wheel Works catalog featured the company’s Crescent bicycle. Children’s bicycles sold for $25, a chain model for $35, and a bevel-gear chainless model for $60.
The North German Lloyd steamship company was founded in 1857. The following year it began weekly service from Bremen to New York, taking an average 11 days and 13 hours. By 1893 the company owned 80 ships, sailing to major ports on all continents.
In 1924 the North German Lloyd Company launched the Columbus, the world’s largest steamship. In 1939, the 35,000 ton German ship avoided capture by the Royal Navy when it was scuttled by its own crew.
The Sparkbrook Manufacturing Company of Coventry, England, was one of many firms that took advantage of the popularity of bicycles around the time of the Fair. This catalog featured six safety bicycles and one tricycle, priced from £13 to £33.
The Columbus Buggy Company of Ohio was one of the largest of the thousands of American horse carriage companies. Very few of these companies had any success in converting to automobiles.
This bucket-pump water purifier was typical of the hand- and foot-powered machines in use before the invention of small electric or gasoline motors.
New Home, based in Orange, Massachusetts, was one of the larger sewing machine companies before Singer dominated the American sewing machine industry. With the market for home and industrial machines saturated, many sewing machine companies turned unsuccessfully to bicycle manufacture.
Burnham & Morrill Company of Portland, Maine, established in 1867, sold canned lobster meat and other foodstuffs.
This 1893 hand-turned milk and cream separator was developed by De Laval Separator Company of New York. Sears, Roebuck sold similar hand-turned separators as late as 1908, at a cost of $28.80 to $43.65.
Brown Brothers Company of Rochester, New York, exhibited its Columbian Trio of grapes at the Fair.
Charles M. Henderson of Adams Street was a Chicago-based shoe manufacturer, selling the Little Red School House line. Henderson was one of many who moved the shoe and boot industry from the Northeast to the Midwest.
Walter Baker & Company, based in Dorchester, Massachusetts, was the nation’s first chocolate maker, dating to 1764. Its delightful pavilion, situated between the Manufactures Building and Music Hall, served coffee, cocoa, and cake as well as chocolate.
Walter Baker & Company’s trademark La Belle Chocolatiere was from a 1743 painting by Jean-Étienne Liotard.
A & C Kaufmann was a Berlin publishing company specializing in advertising, labels, and almanacs. The company’s telegram address was “Kaufmarien.”
Wolfe was a Dutch-based schnapps company. This card shows a Dutch scene in the wintertime, with skaters dressed in their national costumes.
The Enterprise Manufacturing Company of Philadelphia made kitchen utensils. Here a proud Uncle Sam with Columbia at his shoulder demonstrates the company’s meat chopper to Britain’s John Bull and other foreign buyers.
The Kimball organ and piano company was based in Chicago. William W. Kimball came from Maine and sold Boston-made pianos. After the Fire of 1872 he started manufacturing under his own name. At the peak of production Kimball had 1,500 workers and was making 150 organs and 250 pianos each working day.
Kranich & Bach and Malcolm Love, both of New York, were two major piano companies displaying their products at the Fair.
The McLaughlin Coffee Company produced a series of fanciful trade cards showing the residents of the Midway Plaisance. Above are Busherin warriors and their families, to the left are Burmese box makers.
These Charles Graham illustrations show street scenes in the Midway Plaisance. At right, the Egyptian Street. Below, the Ferris Wheel, hot-air balloon, Turkish mosque, and a camel ride.
This detailed map of the World’s Columbian Exposition was prepared by Rand McNally & Company of Chicago. It shows the sites of major buildings, the Midway Plaisance, and the transportation system.
The great men of American electricity—Thomas Edison, Elihu Thomson, George Westinghouse, and Nikola Tesla (an immigrant from Croatia)—were all represented at the Fair. Edison and Thomson of General Electric supported direct current (DC) as the standard to deliver electricity, while the Westinghouse Electric Company proposed the alternating current (AC) system to light the Fair. The “War of the Currents” fought out by Edison and Westinghouse began in 1883 and ranged with increasing ferocity until the World’s Columbian Exposition. Edison’s General Electric Company asked for $1 million to illuminate the Fair, while the Westinghouse winning bid was only half as much. Direct current could be transmitted only short distances, while alternating current could be sent over the wires from a source many miles away. The Westinghouse illuminations of the Fair dazzled the crowds and established alternating current as the more efficient and dominant system (Larson 2003). Westinghouse Electric was awarded the best site in the Electrical Building to showcase its products.
The electricity industry in 1893 was in its early flowering. Five hundred American and over 100 foreign companies displayed their goods in the Electrical Building. Large exhibits from Germany, France, and England and smaller ones from Italy, Canada, and Austria were set up to the right of the main entrance. The American exhibits were grouped according to function. One section showed the machines that generated electrical current, both direct and alternating. Other groupings included electrical motors, lighting and heating, electricity for forging and welding machinery, telegraphs and signaling, the telephone, and electrically powered surgical and dental devices. The many gadgets on display included electric drills and fans, switchboards, the electric streetcar motor, and electric lighting for the home. The first all-electric kitchen range was displayed at the Fair. Electricity ran printing presses and the elevators. One company displayed its electrically powered coat-thief and pickpocket detector and another showed its electric chair (Flinn 1893). The American Bell Company set up the long-distance telephone link between Chicago and New York. Western Electric displayed an Eg
yptian temple illuminated by the company’s incandescent lights. At night a powerful searchlight from the roof of the building could be seen for miles around. Underground tunnels carried the wiring to all the lampposts throughout the Fair. The World’s Columbian Exposition had more electric light bulbs than all of the rest of the city of Chicago (Hirsch & Goler 1990). Elisha Gray demonstrated his “Telautogram”—an electrically powered long-distance telegraph machine. Prominent American companies at the Fair included American Bell, Fort Wayne Electrical, General Electric, Stanley Electric Manufacturing, American Battery, Standard Electric, Westinghouse Electric Manufacturing, and American Gramophone.
America at the Fair Page 14