About the project

Welcome to A Treasury of World's Fair Art & Architecture. This digital collection represents a sampling of artifacts from the rich and varied World's Fair Collection at the Architecture Library, University of Maryland (UM). Although limited in size, this collection is unique for its broad coverage of most international expositions. We invite you to explore the collection by searching for specific images, exploring virtual exhibits, and reading informative essays.

About the collection

In its entirety, the World's Fair Collection is divided into two distinct parts: a) ephemera and graphic materials and b) books and catalogs. The ephemera and graphic materials consists of photographs, stereographs, prints, illustrations, scrapbooks, sheet music, periodicals, maps, pamphlets, and memorabilia, as well as many artifacts, such as trade cards, tickets, exhibitor entry forms, postcards, menus, souvenir ribbons and scarves, and a stereograph viewer. Represented fairs range from the 1851 London exhibition through the present, although the collection's holdings are strongest for the 1876 Philadelphia Centennial exhibition, the 1893 Chicago Exposition, the U.S. fairs (as a whole), and Paris fairs (as a group).

The other, equally significant, part of the collection contains approximately 450 published and catalogued books, many of which are rare. With nearly half of the titles cited as core resources in [include titles of the bibliographies], important subject bibliographies, this collection is notable for its research value. Its holdings are strongest for the fairs held in Paris (as a group), the Crystal Palace Exhibition in 1851, and the Chicago World Columbian Exposition of 1893. All titles are in the libraries' catalog identified by "Spec Collections, World's Fair" in the collection field of the holdings / availability record.

Contacts

For questions regarding the content of this site or about world's fairs, please click here

To report any bugs regarding the operation of the site, please e-mail libdcr@umd.edu.

For comments regarding the site, please contact:

Credits

This digital archive was created by the staff of the Art & Architecture Library, the Information Techonology Division, with the support of the Digital Collections and Research at the University of Maryland Libraries.

Curator and Content Developer

Patricia Kosco Cossard

Database design and development

Paul Hammer and Benjamin Wallberg

Website design

Sean Daugherty and Gretchen Gueguen

Metadata design

Jennifer Roper

Metadata implementation and control

Patricia Kosco Cossard and Jennifer Roper

User Interface design

Patricia Kosco Cossard, Sean Daugherty, Gretchen Gueguen, and Jennifer Roper

Design support

Janet Evander and Joan Stahl

Project documentation

Patricia Kosco Cossard, Daniel Davis, and Gretchen Gueguen

Project management

Patricia Kosco Cossard, Jean Phillips, and Susan Schreibman

We would also like to thank Dr. Isabelle Gournay, Cindy Larimer, Timothy Hackman, Tang Li, Ololade (Tutu) Owoade, and Gail Rumper for their assistance at critical points during this project.