The World's Columbian Exposition, also known as the Chicago World's Fair, was a world's fair held in Chicago from May 5 to October 31, 1893, to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus's arrival in the New World in 1492. The centerpiece of the Fair, held in Jackson Park, was a large water pool representing the voyage that Columbus took to the New World. Chicago won the right to host the fair over several competing cities, including New York City, Washington, D.C., and St. Louis. The exposition was an influential social and cultural event and had a profound effect on American architecture, the arts, American industrial optimism, and Chicago's image.
Bertha Matilde Palmer was an American businesswoman, socialite, and philanthropist.
Sophia Hayden was an American architect and first female graduate of the four-year program in architecture at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
The Isabella quarter or Columbian Exposition quarter was a United States commemorative coin struck in 1893. Congress authorized the piece at the request of the Board of Lady Managers of the World's Columbian Exposition. The quarter depicts the Spanish queen Isabella I of Castile, who sponsored Columbus's voyages to the New World. It was designed by Bureau of the Mint Chief Engraver Charles E. Barber, and is the only U.S. commemorative of that denomination that was not intended for circulation.
Mary Fairchild MacMonnies Low (1858–1946), born in New Haven, Connecticut was an American painter who specialized in landscapes, genre paintings, and portraits.
The World's Congress of Representative Women was a week-long convention for the voicing of women's concerns, held within the World's Congress Auxiliary Building in conjunction with the World's Columbian Exposition. At 81 meetings, organized by women from each of the United States, 150,000 people came to the World's Congress Auxiliary Building and listened to speeches given by almost 500 women from 27 countries.
Lydia Amanda Brewster Sewell was a 19th-century American painter of portraits and genre scenes. Lydia Amanda Brewster studied art in the United States and in Paris before marrying her husband, fellow artist Robert Van Vorst Sewell. She won a bronze medal for her mural Arcadia at The World's Columbian Exposition in 1893. She continued to win medals at expositions and was the first woman to win a major prize at the National Academy of Design, where she was made an Associate Academian in 1903. She was vice president of the Woman's Art Club of New York by 1906. Her works are in several public collections.
Julia Holmes Smith was an American physician, publisher, and suffragist from Georgia. Born to a wealthy family, she received private tutoring then attended a women's school in New York City. Widowed at an early age, Smith remarried in 1872 and attended medical classes at the Boston University School of Medicine and Chicago Homeopathic Medical College. She opened a medical practice in Chicago, Illinois and was the first dean of the National Medical College. In 1895, she was appointed the first female trustee of the University of Illinois.
Ellen Rankin Copp, also called Ellen or Helen Houser Rankin, was an American sculptor. Her works were featured at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.
Mary Ann Greene was a 19th-century American lawyer, writer, and lecturer from Rhode Island. She was the first American woman to be invited to address the World's Congress of Jurisprudence and Law Reform, where she delivered an address upon "Married Women's Property Acts in the United States, and Needed Reforms Therein." She was also the first woman to publish in the American Law Review (1890), and the first woman to argue a case before the Rhode Island Supreme Court (1907). Greene's principal literary works were articles on legal subjects, for magazines and papers, such as The Chautauquan and the American Law Review.
Hanna K. Korany (1871–1898), also seen as Hanna Kurani, was a Syrian writer. From 1893 to 1895 she toured the United States, speaking on women's lives in Syria.
Laura Starr Ware Wilkinson was an American home economist and the first president of the National Household Economic Association, which promoted the new field of domestic economy.
The Woman's Building was designed and built in June 1892, for the World's Columbian Exposition held in Chicago in 1893; under the auspices of the Board of Lady Managers. Out of the twelve main buildings for the Exhibition, the Woman's Building was the first to be completed. It had an exhibition space as well as an assembly room, a library, and a Hall of Honor. The History of the World's Fair states, "It will be a long time before such an aggregation of woman's work, as may now be seen in the Woman's Building, can be gathered from all parts of the world again." The purpose of the building was to highlight woman's achievements, and challenge the traditional ways of thinking at the time it was built. The Woman's Building was planned, designed, and decorated entirely by women under the direction of the board of lady managers.
The Queen Isabella Association was formed to raise funds to provide a statue of Queen Isabella of Spain on the site of the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois. The group's additional purpose was to advance the cause of women's suffrage and equal rights.
Bertha Elizabeth Stringer Lee (1869-1937) was an American painter, known for her California landscapes painted within the California Impressionist style.
Mary Kavanaugh Eagle was an American community leader, clubwoman, book editor, and activist in Protestant missionary work. She served as president of the Woman's Central Committee on Missions since 1882, and was the first president of the Woman's Mission Union, of Arkansas. As a member of the Board of Lady Managers of the World's Columbian Commission, and as chair of the Committee on Congresses, she was selected as editor of the papers read. Eagle served as First Lady of Arkansas during her husband's two terms as the state's 16th Governor.
Mary Blatchley Briggs was an American writer and women's organizer of the long nineteenth century. She served for eleven years as assistant secretary, superintendent, and reporter for the press, and manager of county, state and inter-state fairs. In addition to publishing a volume of poems, she served as secretary of the Western Art Association of Omaha, Nebraska, retiring on January 1, 1891. Briggs was active in organizing woman's work, and also a writer of descriptive matter of the expositions and like areas in which she was interested. Her best known exposition work was for the world's fair at Chicago, where she was one of the two Nebraskans on the Board of Lady Managers of the World's Columbian Exposition and did much toward organizing the Nebraska women for their work for the state and children's building. She managed getting up the representation for her state at New Orleans.
Alice Houghton was a Canadian-born American broker and clubwoman. In her era, she had the distinction of being the only women in Spokane, Washington who was actively engaged as a real estate dealer.
Charlotte F. Dailey was an American editor and exposition official. She compiled the Rhode Island woman's directory, organized the correspondence of Sarah Helen Whitman, and assisted in the editing of Edgar Allan Poe's writings and the preparation of his biography.
