654 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1891. 



undertake to supply any considerable amount of this kind of material, 

 though much will be done by societies, commercial organizations, and 

 public-spirited men and women who niay become interested in the 

 development of certain subjects. I am confident, however, that a 

 moderate expenditure of money and effort in this direction on the part 

 of the officers of the Exhibition will produce most satisfactory results. 

 By no other means can the attractiveness, the educational value, and 

 the permanent usefulness of the exhibition be so greatly enhanced. 



If 1 understand rightly the spirit of the proposed exhibition, it is to 

 show the history of our continent since its European occupation and its 

 intiuence upon the history of the world. It is to expound, as far as may 

 be, the steps of the progress of civilization and its arts in successive 

 centuries, and in all lands up to the present time and their present 

 condition; to be, in fact, an illmtrated encyclopedia of eiviUzation. It 

 is to be so generous in its scope that in its pictorial and literary remains 

 will he preserved the best record of human cnlture in the last decade of the 

 nineteenth century. If such is to be the character of the undertak- 

 ing, it will be necessary to depart very largely from the traditional 

 methods of previous exhibitions, which have usually been preeminently 

 industrial. 



As a student of museum and exhibition administration for twenty 

 years, and as commissioner in charge of the exhibit of the United 

 States at two international exhibitions abroad and officially connected 

 with all the home exhibitions in which the (lovernmeut has ever taken 

 part, it has been my privilege to observe the tendencies of public opin- 

 ion in regard to such matters. 



I am satisfied that more is expected of the Chicago Exhibition than 

 of any previous undertaking of the kind, and that a jironounced de- 

 partuie from traditional methods and the introduction of features new, 

 useful and improving are the conditions of a magnificent success. 



Since 187G a notable change in the theory and practice of exhibition 

 administration has taken place. Magnificent as was the success of the 

 Philadelphia exhibition in its day, if it could be reproduced exactly in 

 Chicago in 1892, it would probably not be considered at all a remark- 

 able affair. 



The successes of the Paris Exposition of 1889, and the equally re- 

 markable achievements of the quartet at South Kensington, namely, 

 the Fisheries Exhibition in 1883, the Health Exhibition in 1881, the 

 Inventions Exhibition in 1885, and the Colonial and Indian Exhibition 

 in 1880, as well as of other special exhibitions in the European capitals, 

 have, it would seem, left little new to be done. 



Installation methods are much more elaborate and effective than 

 ever before; catalogues and labels are more accurate and scholarly. 

 There has been developed a system of handbooks, manuals, and expert 

 reports which, after the close of the exhibition, standing on the shelves 

 of all the great libraries of the world, constitute a lasting monument 

 of the enterprise. A series of inteinational conferences and assem- 



