Women’s Exposition Exhibit

The 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago was a huge event and is fascinating to historians for a wide variety of reasons. One of these reasons is particularly interesting when thinking about the rest of Illinois at this time, and that is that a group of women was given the opportunity to create their own exhibit. This group was called the Illinois Women’s Exposition Board, and was organized to “represent the industries of the women of Illinois at the World’s Columbian Exposition,” and were granted $80,000 to do so.

Past Tracker includes a description of the exhibit that was written by the Board itself, and is significant in multiple ways. First, it is part of the history of the World’s Columbian Exposition itself, and is thus an important part of American social and cultural history. Second, it discusses women’s roles in the planning of the Exposition. Third, this exhibit was specifically about the women of Illinois, so it reveals a picture of what life was like for Illinois citizens in the late nineteenth century, or at least what they wanted the world to think their life was like.

The document explains that the women’s exhibit included a hospital, a pharmacy, a kitchen, and a kindergarten, all staffed by women, as well as an exhibit of material objects that were to represent women’s accomplishments in “the home, the factory, the studio and the professions.” The hospital was open for exhibit visitors to receive free care from female doctors and other healthcare professionals, and the kitchen included cooking lessons and demonstrations of local culinary traditions.

The document concludes by saying that the purpose of the Women’s Exposition Board has been to “show first, the excellence of the work of every kind done by Illinois women; second, the best methods and best results in the affairs of everyday life; third, the new avenues constantly opening by which woman may earn her livelihood or add to the sum of human happiness and wisdom.”

Source: Illinois Board of World’s Fair Commissioners.The Illinois building and exhibits therein at the World’s Columbian Exposition, 1893. Chicago : J. Morris, 1893.

-Cate LiaBraaten

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