THE NEW ORLEANS WORLD’S FAIR.
World’s fairs are special products of modern civilization, and they present in a picturesque and dramatic way the essentials of modern progress, liberty, intercourse between nations, world-wide exchanges. The world’s fairs are for all the world, and representatives of all nations, and the products of all nations are gathered into them. These fairs are milestones of progress; for all new arts and appliances of all lands are exhibited; and they are social gatherings for civilized humanity. If they had no other value than to reflect the unity of mankind under modern liberty and Christianity, they would be worth more than they cost. The spectacle of civilized mankind and the products of their brain and hand collected together in one place is in itself a lesson and an inspiration. The world moves—toward concord, fraternity, unity.
The next world’s fair will have several new values. It is to be held a long distance nearer to the equator than any of its predecessors. It is to be at the mouth of one of the world’s great streams, on the borders of the American Mediterranean, in the midst of the tropical luxuriance of the South. A world’s fair at New Orleans has all the qualities of a luxuriant and inspiring prospective for the imagination. In a dozen ways it invites enthusiasm. It is, for example, one of our reasons for spending so freely our blood and treasure to keep the mouth of the Mississippi within the United States of America; one of the rewards of the South for its own failure to draw a boundary line across that mighty stream. The nation which held the city of New Orleans with a grip of iron, now spends a million and a half to celebrate the concord of humanity in that city. The nation will throng southward this winter, not to secure its territorial integrity, but to celebrate its unity, and the larger unity of mankind. Peace will have larger armies than war had. We shall go in masses, because we want to see our fair South, because it will cost each of us but little, to the land we loved enough to die for, because a tropical world’s fair has for us of the North a fascination which no other fair ever had or ever will have. They are wise down there, and tell us that the tropical display will be the leading feature of the show. Of course it will, and it is that which will attract us and pull us to the exhibition. We have all dreamed of the wealth and magnificence of tropical verdure, and it is to be, so to say, “on tap” in New Orleans next winter when our verdure is asleep under the snow, or nestled at the roots of the trees in saps which are mere possibilities of life next spring. “Tropical display!” What other exhibition could have such a charm?
Rumor says that the railways will astonish us by a schedule of fares which will almost equalize riding and going on foot. They are wise. They could afford to carry us for nothing. Some time, and not a distant time, is to witness a great migration southward. The railroads can richly afford to take us all down there to see the great, rich, open field which has thus far invited us in vain, while we have been following the westering sun to the Pacific coast. Cheap lands, a climate and soil favoring abundant production, undeveloped industrial opportunities, and near markets, attract us, or would attract us, if we realized them. A world’s fair at New Orleans affords the needed incentive to a great movement of many classes of our people to the South. Few of us know the country or its people. The war and the turbulence of the reconstruction era, and political disorders, on which we have no disposition to dwell, have made us strangers and unsympathetic with each other as North and South. The fair will disperse false notions and correct wrong impressions in both sections. It will be a temple of concord for the nation. We shall begin after this celebration of industry to fill up the vacant lands and opportunities of the Gulf region.
The details of the preparations are interesting. The grounds are to be two hundred and twenty-seven acres of land on the banks of the Mississippi. An electric railway is to encircle them, and the spot is accessible both by land and water. The buildings are five in number, and the main edifice is 1,378 feet long and 905 feet wide without courts, and a glass roof, and so arranged within as to afford an unobstructed view of the whole of a magnificent hive of industry. Horticultural Hall is the largest conservatory in the world, 600 feet long and 194 feet wide; and 20,000 plates of fruit, double the number ever before displayed at once, will be shown on the tables. It stands among live oak trees; it will be filled with tropical productions. An infinite variety of southern trees and flowers will be exhibited outside of this hall. Eminent horticulturists are now engaged in arranging for our eyes a bewildering spectacle of the verdure of the lands lying under the rich blessing of the sun. Can New Orleans give shelter and food to all who will visit the exhibition? The people think they can. It is a city of 250,000 people, and from the inception of the enterprise they have had committees at work upon this problem. They are making a thorough canvass of the city for homes for guests; charges will be fixed in advance and strictly supervised throughout the exhibition. Let us all go to the New Orleans World’s Fair.