New e-resource: World’s Fairs: a global history of expositions

To complement the Research Library’s extensive holdings on world’s fairs and expositions, we have recently acquired a new database compiled by Adam Matthew Digital, World’s Fairs: a global history of expositions. Access is available to on-site library readers, Getty staff, and Getty scholars.

This database provides digital access to primary source material collated from thirteen archives in North America, the U.K., and France. Material includes pamphlets, guide books, official catalogues, periodicals, minutes, and correspondence. There is also a selection of visual material including maps, photographs, postcards, and illustrations.

While over 200 hundred fairs are represented, most material relates to the following fairs:

• 1851 Great Exhibition, London
• 1876 Philadelphia Centennial International Exhibition
• 1889 Paris Exposition Universelle
• 1893 Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition
• 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition, St. Louis
• 1915 Panama Pacific International Exposition, San Francisco
• 1933/34 Chicago Century of Progress International Exposition
• 1939/40 New York World’s Fair
• 1967 Expo ’67 Montreal

To explore the library’s holdings on any of these fairs, go to Primo Search. For example, searching “1889 Paris Exposition Universelle” yields over 140 results, including 56 titles from our Special Collections, some of which have been digitized.

For assistance with this database or Primo Search call or visit the Reference Desk.

-Susan Flanagan, Collection Development Librarian for Electronic Resources