GENERAL VIEW, CALIFORNIA EXHIBIT, SEATTLE, 1909
THE FREE ILLUSTRATED LECTURES
were a strong reenforcement to the literature. These lectures were given by the different County Representatives in a hall built and equipped by the State especially for the purpose, and which opened off the main exhibition room. The number of lectures varied from nine to twelve a day, each occupying half an hour, twenty-five minutes for the talk and five minutes to empty and re-fill the hall. They were a popular feature and always well patronized, and their far-reaching and convincing lessons will be realized in benefits to California, and especially to the sections represented, for many years to come. A new departure in Exposition work was the maintenance in the California building of a California
HOTEL INFORMATION BUREAU.
Room and accommodations were gladly given for this feature, which, however, was maintained at the expense of certain contributing hotels that represented practically all important centers of the State. It relieved your Representatives of the duty of supplying information in this particular line of inquiry and insured the work being done better than it could have been otherwise.
DEMONSTRATING BOOTHS
were maintained in the California Building by a number of exhibitors to whom we were pleased to give space for the purpose, as experience teaches that one of the most effective ways of impressing the merits of any particular article is to prove its value by sample. Our preserved fruits, our canned mackerel and our borax products were shown and sampled from artistic booths, while beans, wine, olive oil and other products were demonstrated as occasion required but in a more modest way.
HOSTESSES.
Mrs. Wiggins and Mrs. Filcher who had served so successfully as hostesses at the St. Louis Exposition and at the Portland Exposition, were installed as hostesses of the California Building at Seattle, the compensation to be determined after the close of the Exposition when our financial condition would be better understood, they agreeing in advance to abide by the outcome. This arrangement was an incentive to extra economy on their part, and it may be said they seconded every effort of your Representatives in that direction, and yet they maintained California’s reputation for hospitality admirably, and became favorites in the large Hostesses’ Association of the Exposition, of which Mrs. Wiggins was one of the leading officials.