A short distance from the main fairgrounds, the Midway Plaisance offered visitors a more brash and voyeuristic experience. In addition to carnival amusements like a Ferris Wheel, the Midway featured ethnographic villages complete with real humans. If the displays of manufactures and art in Jackson Park represented peak civilization, the Chinese Tea House and Dahomey Village were supposed to represent semi-civilization and savagery, respectively. It is clear today that racism, exoticism, and colonialism undergirded the World’s Columbian Exposition. “Oriental” and “Occidental” persons in stereotypical dress were immortalized in photo books, perpetuating the harmful notions that racial categories are legitimate and that most people—save White Americans and some White Europeans— exist outside of time and progress.

Covering almost 700 acres and featuring almost 200 buildings, the Exposition necessitated a thorough visitor’s guide. A plethora of publishers printed guides to the White City and the Midway Plaisance, all promising to help visitors make the most of a multiday visit. Some guides contain maps or are bilingual. The density and amount of text in all the guides will surprise contemporary viewers. Each guide delves into the background and history of the Exposition and contains detailed descriptions of popular exhibits and objects.

Though it purported to be a pure display of progress, the Exposition was a huge commercial enterprise. Economic opportunities opened by the fair continued after its close. Businessmen and publishers capitalized on the Exposition’s popularity and worked to keep it in the public’s imagination by selling commemorative plates, postcards, photo books, and more. Consumers of subscriptions services could receive photos of the fair’s grounds, buildings, and sideshows each week. For those who had visited Chicago, this subscription was a way to relieve their experiences; for those who did not make it to the cultural event, flipping through photos could make them feel like they did.