The World’s Columbian Exposition (also known as the Chicago World’s Fair) was held in Chicago in 1893 to celebrate the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s arrival in the New World in 1492. The exposition was an influential social and cultural event and had a profound effect on architecture, sanitation, the arts, Chicago’s self-image, and American industrial optimism. More than 27 million people attended the exposition during its 6-month run. Its scale and grandeur far exceeded previous world’s fairs.
The legacies of this World’s Fair are legion, including the telautograph (precursor to the fax machine), picture postcards, commemorative coins and stamps, spray painting, the automatic dishwasher, the first electric moving sidewalk, a braille writer, products such as Cream of Wheat and Juicy Fruit gum, and the Ferris Wheel. Our version of this first-ever ferris wheel was made by our maintenance crew for the 2015 exhibit and is now on permanent display near the general store (look up!).
A most notorious legacy was that of Dr. Henry Howard Holmes, one of the first documented serial killers in modern times. Holmes opened the World’s Fair Hotel, about 3 miles west of the Chicago fair area. He designed and built the hotel specifically with murder in mind, and it was the location of many of them. He confessed to 27 murders, of which nine were confirmed, but his actual body count could be as high as 200.
The Fair That Changed America is open to the public August 13-December 31, 2025. Admission is $7 for adults, $3 for children 6-17, and free for Museum members. The Plymouth Historical Museum is open Wednesday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, 1-4 pm.
Saturdays in August are free admission, thanks to anonymous donors.
Come in and see the upgrades just completed while we were closed. We have new floor tile on our main level!
Thank you to our exhibit sponsor The Ledger!
