The Unbelievable & Illogical Story of the COLUMBIAN EXPOSITION (Chicago World’s Fair 1893) Part 1

...sometimes it just doesn't make sense...

The story about the Columbian Exposition (aka Chicago World’s Fair of 1893) is this: It had been only 20 years since the GREAT Fire leveled the city and they (meaning the fair people) wanted to host an event. They chose an undeveloped swamp area in Chicago to build the fair because it was easy to get land rights since the land was otherwise unusable…

In 1890, the World’s Columbian Commission was established by Congress to plan the fair. The Commission generously allotted the fair organizers with a nice chunk of tax dollars; $10 million to be exact (which is equal to roughly $350 million in today’s currency). The fair grounds were then built in less than two years on the swampland. According to history, marvelous makeshift buildings were quickly thrown together; constructed from cheap wood. A plaster blend was then applied to the wood. Historians state this material was “similar to paper mâché”, which was then painted using oil paints. The oil paint artists had the ability to make the cheap buildings look so real that patrons could not tell the difference.

The fair itself was a short event, running only from May 1, 1893 to October 30, 1893. After the fair, the area was demolished and never spoken of in history class textbooks. In fact, few people in 2025 have ever heard of World’s Fairs. I just learned of them myself a few years back and wrote a series on them. Despite writing the series, I still had a lot of unanswered questions, so I decided to take a second look and I'm glad I did…

Here are a few of the buildings from the 1893 Columbian Exposition, which they claim were quickly thrown together from garbage material and built on top of an otherwise-unusable swamp:

History claims the planning phase ended September 9th of 1891 and the fair opened May 1st of 1893. That is only 20 total months of build time. Even if built from cheap materials, this sure seems like a lot to accomplish, does it not? Have you ever built anything? It took a summer to finish my little basement... and my house wasn’t on top of a swamp…

… and you also may be thinking “These don’t look very temporary to me…”…

…which was exactly my thought, but…

… history insists these were all quickly-constructed props…

The fair opened May 1st of 1893 and closed October 30th of the same year making it under six months long. Seems like a heck of a lot of work for such a short event…

Let’s take a closer look at these fair buildings. To understand the size and magnitude of the “props” we can reference Ford Field, the NFL stadium where my home team, the Detroit Lions, play. The white roof measures 700 feet x 640 feet (213 meters x 195 meters):

The Ford Field building is 128 feet high (36m). Here’s a good view that shows the size of the building compared to the size of people:

The actual field is 360 feet long (109m):

On the Ford Field website we learn it took six years to build this one building - and this is using all of today’s modern technology; backhoes, cranes, power tools, etc. Granted, Ford Field isn’t a prop building, but it is just a single building and it took six years. Meanwhile, at the fair, there were nearly 100 buildings, all created in 20 months… on a swamp...

The Administration Building was 275 feet tall (84m)

This means it was over-double the height of Ford Field:

The United States Government Building was the same height and measured 420 feet long (128m):

This building was roughly 100 feet longer than a football field

The Illinois Building was built in the shape of a “Greek Cross” measuring 450’ long x 150’ wide (137x46m) with each axis measuring hundreds of feet. The dome itself was 152’ in height (46m).

To give you an idea of how tall just the dome was, a 15-story building is roughly 150 feet high:

Yes, the dome alone was taller than a 15-story building. This leads you to say, “Quite a bit of weight for cheap wood and plaster to hold, eh?”

The Machinery Hall was 850’ x 500’ (209m x 152m)

Wanna know what 850 feet looks like? The Space Needle in Seattle is only 604 feet tall. Lay this space needle on it’s side and add another 250 feet:

Perhaps it would be easier to say it is the length of the white roof on Ford Field plus an additional 100 feet:

The Electricity Building measured 350’ x 700’ (106m x 216m)

That is the exact length of the white roof:

In the news article below we get to learn about the Agricultural Building, which was this:

It alone covered over 9 acres of land. The building itself measured 800’ x 500’ (244m x 152m) and featured five pavilions, one at each corner and one in the center. Its Corinthian columns were each 5 feet wide and 40 feet tall (1.5m x 12m). The center dome on the building was 100 feet in diameter and was surmounted by a glass dome 130 feet high (40m). Eight entrances to the building were 20 feet wide each (6m).

800 feet is approximately the height of the One World Trade Center skyscraper:

How about we look at the skyscraper from a different angle:

Yep, call some terrorists, tell ‘em to knock that skyscraper on it’s side, and that’s how long the cheap, temporary World’s Fair building was, but let’s not forget, it was also 500 feet in height, which is equal to the height of almost four Ford Field stadiums stacked on top of each other:

Each Corinthian column was the height of a street light:

The Horticulture Building was amongst one of the most impressive

It measured 1,000’ x 250’ x 114’. To put this into perspective, 1,000 feet is roughly the length of a cruise ship:

And 250 feet tall happens to be nearly the height of a cruise ship like the Icon of the Seas:

This Horticulture Building featured a curved-glass dome roof which allowed for light to come through. (304m x 76m x 34m)

Here’s a better view showing the magnitude of the dome:

It’s quite an impressive thing to put on a temporary building because at the time, to make curved glass, a kiln was required. The heating and cooling process took anywhere from 12 to 20 hours per piece depending on the size. For a single dome of this magnitude, each section of roof needed approximately 1,000 handmade pieces of glass, therefore they needed to manufacture over ten thousand pieces of custom curved glass, with each piece curved to the exact angle of the dome’s frame:

The smaller domes also featured glasswork.

It’s quite amazing that cheap wood could support the weight of glass…

… because 6mm glass, such as this…

…weighs 1.7 pounds per square foot and was said to have been put on top of a 250 foot tall building made from cheap wood and plaster. 250 feet is said to be the height of The Sphinx landmark at it’s highest point:

Those were just a few of the many buildings. Although we are told they were made of junk material, the descriptions of the buildings tell us this was not the case. Other than curved glass, some (if not all) featured real marble. Have you ever held a piece of real marble? A standard marble slab that is 3cm thick typically weighs between 600 - 700 pounds:

In addition to being incredibly heavy, it is not a cheap, temporary material, so it is confusing as to why they would choose this for an event that is going to be demolished after being open under six months. I should probably also mention, history claims the marble columns, along with everything else that needed to be raised into the air, was accomplished using rope-and-pulley systems.

This decision, made by Fair organizers, to use permanent materials to create magnificent structures which will have to be dynamited then disposed of, was apparently common. We know this to be true because there are still several buildings standing to this day that are allegedly remnants from World’s Fairs. We discussed them in my series, so let’s look back at a few of them really quick:

One example of a building that was built for a fair and can still be seen is in California; the 140,000 square foot Palace of Fine Arts:

We can see this magnificent structure on the aerial view image of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition (World Fair) of 1915:

And here it is today on Google maps. It doesn’t seem very temporary to me, but what do I know?

The Petit Palais was part of the 1900 Universalle Exposition. History claims all of the buildings in this event were quickly thrown together and completed in under three years.

The Musée d’Orsay was made for the same 1900 Paris Exposition:

Want to see the ceiling?

Here is The Castle of the Three Dragons, made for the nine-month-long 1888 Barcelona Universal Exposition:

The Arc de Triomf was a display built for the same 1888 Barcelona Universal Exposition:

I guess their version of “temporary” and my version of “temporary” are two different things?

So much plaster, so little time….

The Civic Aquarium of Milan was born 119 years ago for the Milan International of 1906, another six-month long event:

Here’s the Royal Exhibition Building from the Melbourne World’s Fair of 1880, a seven month long event. This one is definitely temporary - 144 years worth of it:

Here’s a better view:

Inside of it during the fair:

Inside now:

The Grand Palais was built for the 1900 Universalle Expo to accompany the Petit Palais we looked at a minute ago:

Yep, two years to build this guy, along with the other castle, along with 100 additional “temporary” structures… and without modern machinery… or steady electricity… or vehicles… using rope-and-pulleys…

(125 years temporary, by the way)

A lot of kilns ran for this curved glass roof…

In fact, one of the buildings still standing today was from the 1893 Columbian Exposition that we are discussing in this article. It’s now the Museum of Science & Industry in Chicago:

Mmmhmm…

Apparently this particular building wasn’t built out of cheap wood and plaster? But the rest were?

… yet when we look at the photos from the 1893 Columbian Exposition, all of the buildings look the same…?

So this one was plaster but the one left standing wasn’t?

This is an incredible amount of detail to carve, even into plaster…

And don’t forget, they also had to make all of the statues…

For the Columbia Exposition, in addition to the aforementioned buildings, there were massive hand-excavated lagoons…

The Southern Lagoon measured 1,687’ x 787’ (514m x 240m):

This is equal to over nine Olympic-sized swimming pools.

Despite being on a swamp, the water in the lagoons was not swamp water.

History tells us the plants in the lagoons and around the property, as well as all of the trees, were all imported and planted.

Imagine being tasked with bringing in all of these large trees:

Yet another incredible accomplishment because when I planted around my pond, it took many years for it to grow in.

Back to the buildings themselves: History claims the exquisite buildings housed “over 65,000 assorted exhibits” (that was not a typo, history actually claims this). In addition to that, a 250-foot Ferris wheel was a main attraction. 250 feet is the height of a giant Sequoia tree:

For reference, there currently is a Ferris wheel in Chicago, located on the Navy Pier; The Centennial Ferris Wheel. It measures only 196 feet tall, making it 54 feet shorter than its predecessor from the 1800s:

In all fairness to the fair organizers, they did indeed build some things, but you can tell what they built because it doesn’t match the beauty of the other buildings:

Some of it, such as the Idaho Building, doesn’t even look like it was in the same location as the fair:

The more you look at the photos of the structures we know they did build, you must ask yourself why they didn’t put nice roofs, glass domes or any detail into them despite importing so many trees?

This image shows a stark contrast in building styles. LOL, I guess?

Many of the buildings are so unimpressive that they have been completely scrubbed from history. The only way to view them is in books of the time.

In fact, when they tried to replicate the World’s Fairs in the 1960s, the public was greatly disappointed by the finished products:

You would think with so many advances in technology, the 1960s fairs would be far superior to the beauty and architecture of the 1800s fairs, right? If it only took 20 months to build magnificent structures on swamps back then, imagine what we shoulda been able to crank out in 1960.

As you can see, none of what we are being told makes a damn bit of sense, so I decided to dig deeper…

NEXT READ: THE PANIC, THE METALS & THE FAIR - The Story of the 1893 Columbian Exposition You Never Heard

But in the meantime, bringing you truth you haven’t seen elsewhere, so real history can be documented before it’s forever scrubbed, takes a lot of time and energy. If you want to support my efforts please consider keeping me hydrated:

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