In 1915, the Panama–Pacific International Exposition announced San Francisco’s recovery from the 1906 earthquake that had devastated the city. This chapter examines why the fair organizers and architects used classical architecture to promote San Francisco’s economic success and to articulate the continued narrative of American progress. Roman architectural forms were used extensively in many of the fair’s courts, including the Court of the Universe. The neo-antique architecture and sculpture of the Court of the Universe was also a crucial way for the fair organizers to demonstrate San Francisco’s unique position (due to its West Coast geography) to develop economic ties with Asia. Neo-antique architecture helped to prove that San Francisco was a modern city, fully recovered from the catastrophic 1906 earthquake and poised for cultural and economic greatness. This chapter also examines why other state and national pavilions were erected in a classicizing style, demonstrating the potency and flexibility of ancient architecture in conveying different aims. Bernard Maybeck’s Palace of Fine Arts was the fair’s architectural hallmark. His decision to evoke the ruins of ancient Rome for his Palace was a strikingly modern choice and stands in contrast to the celebratory architecture of the rest of the fair.

The 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition commemorated the 1803 Louisiana Purchase. The St. Louis fair was the first organized after the United States had obtained a territorial empire in 1898. While it might seem evident that classicizing architecture should be used to serve empire, surprisingly, it was not. The so-called “Free Renaissance” architecture of the fair was not primarily classical. Instead, under the banner of the Free Renaissance, vaguely historical and undeniably imposing, if not supersized, buildings were erected. The most original building at the fair, the Mines and Metallurgy Building, embodied the spirit of the neo-antique, combining multiple historical forms, including Egyptian, Greek, and Roman architecture. Cass Gilbert designed the fair’s Palace of Fine Arts. Now the St. Louis Art Museum, the building is modeled on the Baths of Caracalla and demonstrates that one of the most enduring appropriations of ancient architecture was for buildings associated with high and elite culture. While Roman architecture was used in several important buildings, many of the key edifices, including the Festival Hall, did not evoke ancient architecture. Certain state pavilions and territories—with no apparent connection to antiquity—employed classicizing forms to demonstrate their progress and cultural sophistication.

Composed of twenty-four states (2.6 million square miles), the Trans-Mississippi region was once described as the “Great American Desert”, due to its sparse population. This narrative gave way to one of settlement and progress as the region became home to white settlers, who displaced Indigenous Americans. To many, the region represented the West, agriculture, and the frontier. Omaha (Nebraska) hosted the Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition in 1898. The fair aimed to demonstrate that Omaha and the Trans-Mississippi region were economically important. The fair organizers utilized ancient architecture to create the fair’s main court and purposefully evoked Chicago’s Court of Honor. The fair’s architects incorporated original details that reflected the influence of the Arts and Crafts movement. The fair’s second season, named the Great American Exposition, reused the fairgrounds and its architecture to create the first colonial exhibition in the United States. The intersection between classicizing architecture and colonialism is also explored. Ancient Egyptian architecture was erected only in the Midway, the fair’s entertainment zone, reflecting a shift in how Americans perceived Egypt and architecture. Lastly, the chapter explores how Indigenous Americans were architecture-less at this fair and how this reflects their marginalized position in American society.

The introduction argues that architecture is a valuable but underutilized medium for understanding classical reception. It contextualizes architectural studies in classical reception research and explores why scholars have not fully examined architecture as a lens for reception. It also provides an overview of the current state of the field of classical reception studies and the role of architectural studies within it. The book’s central argument is that ancient architecture at U.S. world’s fair–specifically in Chicago, Nashville, Omaha, St. Louis, and San Francisco–embodied abstract ideas and ambitions, helping each city project itself as a modern, progressive metropolis with a unique local identity, rivaling major global cities like New York, London, and Paris. The introduction outlines theoretical frameworks such as hyperreality, which can be applied to the study of the architecture of world’s fairs. It also introduces the neo-antique, a concept for analyzing the reception of classical (Greco-Roman) and Egyptian architecture together. Additionally, the chapter surveys the historiography of world’s fairs and situates this study within this context, arguing for the importance of architecture as a type of evidence for understanding world’s fairs as a phenomenon. The introduction concludes with a summary of the book’s five chapters.

The Tennessee Centennial Exposition of 1897 celebrated the centennial of Tennessee’s admission to the United States. This chapter argues that the use of Greek and Grecian architecture at Nashville was connected to Nashville’s reputation as a city of learning and culture. During the nineteenth century, Nashville was known as the Athens of the South and of the West. A life-sized replica of the Parthenon was the fair’s premier building. Archaeological accuracy and color were also essential to creating the fair’s Parthenon. Other buildings incorporated classical motifs from different periods, demonstrating the flexibility and fluidity of ancient architecture and embodying the neo-antique. This classical architecture embodied Nashville’s arrival as a city, but it also celebrated the New South and reflected the codification of the racist Jim Crow laws. Thus, the appropriation of classical architecture to justify institutional racism is examined. Egyptian architecture played a prominent role here. Shelby County erected a pyramid for its pavilion, which was an exceptional use of Egyptian architecture at United States fairs. The chapter concludes with a consideration of the enduring importance of the rebuilt Nashville Parthenon (and its Athena statue) as a symbol of culture and democracy for the city.

The conclusion summarizes the book’s core arguments – specifically, that studying the reception of ancient architecture at the world’s fairs at Chicago, Nashville, Omaha, St. Louis, and San Francisco furthers our understanding of the complex and possibly conflicting and contradictory ways in which the ancient world and its architecture were understood in the United States between 1893 and 1915. The appropriation of classical architecture for museums and fine art galleries emerges as a major theme. While classical architecture could be used to justify empire and institutional racism, it could also symbolize democracy and cultural sophistication. The fluidity and flexibility of ancient architecture underscore why it was so widely and creatively adapted in the United States. The physical legacy of these fairs – the buildings that survived and the parks – is also considered. In addition, the conclusion discusses the decline of ancient architecture as one of the most potent ways in which fair organizers expressed their cultural, political, and economic goals; the rejection of historical forms was vital to the birth of architectural Modernism. In sum, neo-antique architecture at American world’s fairs helped the nation and various cities to forge imagined ties to a glorious past, frame the present, and envisage the future.

Chicago’s Columbian Exposition, or White City, marked the 400th anniversary of Columbus’s “discovery” of the “New World” and showcased Chicago’s ambition to be a modern metropolis. While Chicago’s architecture is often labeled as Beaux-Arts or Roman, this chapter argues that the architecture of its key buildings and central spaces embodied the bricolage of the neo-antique. The White City established neo-antique architecture as the preferred architectural idiom for American world’s fairs. This architecture also demonstrated that the United States was now a cultural, economic, and political powerhouse. The lasting impact of the White City’s architecture is evident in urban planning, especially in the City Beautiful movement and in civil buildings built after the fair. Other buildings at the fair, such as Haiti’s pavilion, also utilized classicizing architecture. For Haiti, the ideals of democracy and the cultural cachet of classical culture informed the choice of classical architecture here. Ancient Egyptian architecture also appeared in the form of a replica of the Temple of Luxor, located in the Midway Plaisance, the fair’s entertainment zone, aiming to educate and entertain visitors. The reception of ancient architecture at the White City reflects the complex and sometimes contradictory relationship between nineteenth-century America and the ancient world.