...Just like our women's basketball team. We lost seven straight and now have won two in a row since the Christmas break. And tonight, I got to broadcast a super exciting overtime victory down here in Northridge (for you non-Californians, Northridge is in the Valley... of "Valley Girl" notoriety). P.S. I love it here. 75 degrees in the dead of winter? Yes, please! After our 76-70 OT win, we bussed down to Orange County tonight and have the entire day off tomorrow! I can't wait. I'm moving down here some day.
Again, I've managed to start things off with a tangent.
Well, in my quest to blog every day in January, I'm going to start with the book Michelle and I are reading for our "book club" (feel free to join us so we seem more legit, otherwise I'm just another babbling English major here!): Devil in the White City, which follows The World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago back in 1893. It takes an interesting point of view, tracking one of the main architects of the exposition and the murder behind the dark ending to the Exposition. However, I've only gotten as far as the background information and narrative about the main architect.
I'll get into the book the further I get into the reading, but I couldn't help but think when I first opened the book, "What the heck is an exposition and why don't we have them anymore??"
Now, I don't claim to be an expert since reading this by any means, but I did take the time to do a bit of Internet research on the topic.
Prior to reading Devil, I only knew one thing really about the World Expositions. They gave us probably the most notable, visited, recognized, amazing structure of all (that is in my subjective opinion):
But really, what else do I know about World Fairs/Expositions?
Essentially, the phenomenon began as a way of flexing a country's might, power, wealth and affluence during the highly developmental period better known as the Industrial Revolution. Ironically, the first large-scale expo to take place was the Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in Hyde Park, London, 1851. Even this was not the first, but the first at the level to which the British took it.
In 1844, the French Industrial Exposition was part of a larger display of French national industrial expositions aimed at improving national output in areas such as agriculture, technology, etc., beginning in 1798. The Exposition included the construction of a highly-visible temporary structure located on the Champs-Élysées.
As for the Exposition in London, the Crystal Palace was erected in Hyde Park to draw attendance and spark interest, and exhibits ran the gamut from precious gems found by British explorers, to modern lock technology, to improvements to the structure of the piano and even included the chance to rub elbows with some of England's greatest poets/novelists of the day. A veritable Who's Who of England, visible on a global scale.
Not to be outdone at their own celebration of nationalism, the French then returned the geographical rivalry in 1889, trying to top England with the Exposition Universelle (a universal expo, in just the name alone, must be greater than England's mere world expo).
Hidden behind the guise of celebrating the 100th anniversary of the storming of the Bastille in 1789, the Universal Expo spanned widely throughout the center of Paris, to what would become one of the largest cultural centers in the world. Constructed to attract fair-goers was the arch entrance and proclaimed as one of the largest eyesores in the history of construction, or more fondly known today as the beacon of the City of Lights, The Eiffel Tower (And to think, it was originally designed to be placed in Barcelona).
Needless to say, the Universal Expo was the best yet. It included world-renown opera, talents and concerts of the top composers, "Wild West" gun displays and an even larger, more brilliant diamond than the one previously on display in London.
With France and England duking out their cultural and industrial progressiveness, the United States did not want to miss out on the arms race going on across the Atlantic Ocean. Each exposition got bigger and better, leading to the birth of the skyscraper in Chicago, during the 1893 expo to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Columbus' discovery of the New World.
So that's all in the glorious, murky, industrially-clouded and sooten past. But have you ever heard of world fairs since the Industrial Rev?
Supposedly, into the Cold War, San Francisco and Stockholm took their shots at becoming "the (cultural) centers of the universe" for a brief period of time. Montreal held the Expo 67 (thus lending its name to the now defunct Montreal Expos baseball team), which set the single-day record for a world fair's attendance. And beginning in the 1980s, world fairs transformed to become a vehicle for city improvement on a global scale (let's be honest, as if that hadn't always been the case??).
In the contemporary period, the Olympic Games have invariably morphed to take on the same characteristics as the world fairs, but under the guise of healthy, athletic competition (which is a different means, same end result, world "dominance"). For example, Spain held the Expo 92 as well as the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games. How could one not argue Spain's monetary dominance over the world that year?
In my lifetime, no big deal has been made over a world exposition. Perhaps the Olympics have taken over in that realm? Well make the case for China being THE world power right now, after hosting the 2008 Beijing Olympics, they are the next country to host Expo 2010 in Shanghai which will run from May to October this year. Shanghai is trying to exert its prowess as the world's major economic and cultural center in the new decade. Currently plans for a new train and transportation networks are in the works.
Although the world fairs may not be as grand and as much of an arms race as their heyday in the 19th century, wouldn't it be great to witness such an event in a lifetime?
Ok, back to my reading.... :) Hope you all enjoyed your history lesson for the day.
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