The Artistic Guide to Chicago and the World’s Columbian Exposition Illustrated

The first edition of a scarce guide to the 1893 Columbian Exposition in Chicago.

Though it was first published shortly before the opening of the 1893 World’s Fair, this guidebook and souvenir of Chicago’s Columbian Exposition include much more than just the White City and adjacent Midway Plaisance. Photographs and accompanying text describe “the wonderful growth of Chicago, from a moorland traversed only by Indian trails in 1831, to a splendid metropolis with a million and a quart of inhabitants in 1891” [preface].

Information on the city’s history, local attractions, suburbs, and more can be found within the attractive gilt embossed covers. Also included are a fold-out bird’s eye view of the city of Chicago from Lake Michigan, and a separate panorama of the fairgrounds just a little further south.

Both were issued locally by A. Zeese & Company. This is the first edition of the volume, published in Chicago by R.S. Peale Company in 1892. A publisher’s notice near the front promises subsequent issues will contain portraits of Exposition officials, which were not engraved in time for inclusion, as well as other illustrations and a more detailed map of the Exposition Grounds. It goes on to claim, “this is undoubtedly the largest and finest and the most expensive book for the money ever published” – an amusing claim, to say the least.