New york in 2016. Hi. York foro buffalo, new our regular book event. Is leslie, and it is my pleasure to welcome our special , who, Margaret Creighton has written a wonderful new book, and mark, writer for the buffalo news. Have a conversation with margaret, then we will open it up. Thank you for being here. [applause] hi, margaret. , mark. T hi mark great to see such a turnout. They make history really come alive. It is one of those rare books that does just that. Many people know about the book that talked about the exhibition , the city, a very prosperous city. Your book is the first fulllength book that focuses specifically on the history of one of the great events that happen in buffalo. Major events in the united is one of 15lo cities to host a worlds fair in the United States. The next worlds fair is going to be anyone know . Probably not. The United States is not slated to participate in that worlds fair. It was a big deal for buffalo to host the worlds fair. Margaret, talk about that. Buffalo at mean for that time to host the worlds fair. So buffalo was a big deal at the turnofthecentury. We are seeing that same type of optimism now, but it was very proud of its accomplishments and its stateoftheart the finest asphalt streets in the country, electric streetcars, electric lights. , 300 50,000 people at the turnofthecentury. It had fathered two president s and it had big dreams. One of the things that hope to do was to become bigger and raise its profile, so one of the ways that cities do this is to host a huge exposition, and buffalo had big ideas that its panamerican exhibition would be even more grand than the world spare the took place in chicago 1893. So. Mark electricity was still new and played a big part. The fairalk about how looked that night. Tower was one of the signature buildings of the exhibition. Was all about electricity in many ways. Command overd the the natural world, represented to bringa falls electric current into the fair and illuminate the grounds. The big event was the elimination that took place, and by this. Re awed they tried to move their way initiallyee what were pinpricks of light blossom into a beautiful glow that brought the fairgrounds alive. This is one of the biggest hits of the fair. Mark the choice of colors and how the colors were used told the story. Can you talk about that . Aboutet the fair was civilization,rn and the fair directors wanted to convey a message about how people had moved, particularly the United States, from a position of savagery to the apex of civilization, so they translated this message into the colors of the fair, so when you entered on the periphery of the grounds, you would be entering at places where buildings were tinted warm reds, oranges, yellows that represented the more barbaric races, and as you move towards the electric tower, were more pale, then you reach the signature tower in notows and white, so it was difficult for people to understand the allegory about race. Mark in the way color was used in a racial way, people of color were also portrayed in an amazingly disturbing way, actually. There was the Darkest Africa , the old plantation, the way native americans were depicted, including geronimo, on loan from a state prison, so reading the stories now, it is really shocking. Margaret it is distressing to us now. We have to remember this was the segregation,ow, lynching, so it should not be surprising as we look back and see how the fair officials put this all together, and it is a story about supremacy, particulate race supremacy, and ofy convey their notions this through exhibits. You mentioned the old plantation, which brought in africanamerican performers to enact the socalled good old days before the civil war, and these were performers who picked cotton, saying, and danced, et cetera. Mark this was four decades the end of the civil war. Margaret thats right. Else that people when they read your book will be thrown for a loop has to do with animal welfare. There were a couple of events that were very shocking. One tells about the plan public execution of an elephant, known as jumbo two. The first was a beloved animal paraded around the country. The second concerned the mass slaughter of dogs that occurred at the panamerican exhibition, which people were paying extra to witness. So perhaps you can tell us about those . Margaret lets start with the dogs. I said this is one of the most shocking things i came across, shelters in buffalo and buffalo parks, dogs were rounded up, poodles, terriers, cross breeds, rounded up and brought to the fair where they were killed, then the native peoples of the fair eight those. Ogs in a dog feast the Humane Society in buffalo was very progressive, the Second Society in the United States, and they were very distressed by they but at the same time wanted to acknowledge the cultural traditions of the native performers, like geronimo , who helped to orchestrate this, said they did not want to interfere. So it was a very troubling event , but also an event that revealed the cultural tensions and challenges of this fair. There were some positive aspects about this fair and depictions of people not from the United States, particularly the presentation of latin american countries. From reading your book, it sounded like latin american countries got short shrift in previous fares, not in buffalo. Margaret thats right. One of the things buffalo should way theyof it is the invited latin american republics to be part of this exhibition and gave them a platform on which to speak and talk back to the United States, particularly cuba. Fought a war in cuba and were now involved in governing cuba. Cuban dignitaries came to buffalo and said we would prefer if the United States gave us our complete freedom, so the fair gave these countries exhibit space they could show off their accomplishments, art, educational products, et cetera, but also gave him a way to talk American Foreign policy, which i think is interesting. You people the book with many fascinating characters. , the person whose followed or right before with anarchist, the assassin of way mckinley. You have a lot to say about him. William mckinley. You have a lot to say about him. Margaret the way i frame the was to talk about his desire to be in anarchist. Im not sure the anarchist community really embraced him, but to talk about his mental illness. , ands clearly a sick man he also gave a number of short speeches about how he was driven and motivated by being unemployed and unable to get access to health care. We dont want to have much sympathy with this guy because he did terrible things, but he brought up issues that are real issues and continue to be something we discussed. I never say his name right. Margaret it is interesting. In buffalo, the paper said it czolgosz, and yet other interpretations pronounced differently, or perhaps we have people who can help us pronounce this name. Mark anybody . We will go with czolgosz. He is at the temple of music with the revolver in his hand waiting to kill the president. There is someone else named jim exslave. He winds up corralling czolgosz to the ground, and at first to celebrate it as a black man who got the guy who shot the president , then later something and history is turned on its head as to what actually happened, and it has an unfortunate effect on the rest of mr. Parkers life. Margaret right. Jim parker helped to tackle the assassin and was recognized as one of the heroes of the moment because he prevented czolgosz from firing a third round, and certainly for the next eight days, he was seen as the hero who mightve saved mckinleys life. But a funny thing happened, after he was hailed as the savior, certainly you have the secret service and other individuals there to guard the president coming out and saying, we certainly did our job. That man was not there at all,hen in the trial of czolgosz his testimony was never called for, never called on, and he was edited out and erased from the memory of the event. He went around the country for pretty much the rest of his life , talking on street corners, in variousple churches and so forth talking about the role he played, and eventually died in philadelphia, found on the streets and destitute. Mark very tragic. One of the people in your book is the smallest person, only two chiquita. Known as margaret she is one of my favorite characters in the story. Isay characters, this nonfiction and these are all real people. Was born in guadalajara , about 26 inches tall, and was discovered by a showman when she was living in new york and was brought to the fair as one of the highlights of the midway, and she was named the mascot of the exposition, which is she wasing, because tiny, a little person. Her as a cuban, and the fact she was a mascot was a perfect representation of what the United States saw as its relationship with cuba, uncle sam, the protector of this Little Island nation, so she became a celebrated individual and was not treated very well by her manager, and at one point late in the exposition, she left very suddenly, and i dont want to ruin the story, but it is quite a traumatic departure. Mark a lot of people are familiar with the story of the woman who was the first to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel, and she survived. She hoped to capitalize on that experience and make a lot of money, but it didnt really happen, did it . Taylor. poor annie she was destitute, like so many other characters, and she decided she would make money for over the life by going falls and be the first person to survive. I dont want to spoil things i dont have to spoil things, she makes it and becomes an incredible celebrity, especially on the last day of the fair, but people dont think when they look at her, something she does does not seem quite right. Say she doesnt look limber. She did this amazing thing, and then wanted to go on the road , and her managers could not convince people she had done this daredevil trick because she did not fit the part. , sheasnt young, beautiful didnt look like a spunky one ofion, so eventually her managers stole her barrel and put someone else into play the part of any taylor and she was left to sell postcards in Niagara Falls the rest of her life. There was a lot riding on this worlds fair in buffalo, especially the ruling class, they ponied up 500,000, which is a lot more money than it is today in a matter of hours. They got together and emerged and made commitments for that much money because they wanted the worlds fair in buffalo and not in detroit, right . Margaret thats right. Mark so there was a lot of pressure to get a big return. 8 Million People went through the turnstiles. That would seem to be a lot of people, but there was constant pressure all the time to drum up more interest, get more people to come, and in the end, they still fell short. They made enough money to return money back to everyone who made an investment in the fair. Margaret the producers were extraordinarily optimistic and it field the optimism, this is going to be possibly bigger than chicago. This is going to be the best fare ever held in the United States because we pulled ourselves out of recession. People have money. 40 Million People can come to buffalo very easily on overnight trains. It is basically going to be the hit of the century, so there was a tremendous amount of overconfidence. Other things that played into the shortfall, the weather was bad in the spring and early summer, the advertising people say later was a bit off. There was also some speculation that the focus on latin america had not brought in the numbers of people who really wanted to see exhibits produced by and they or germans, were unclear as to what to expect from the latin american byws, so they were concerned the middle of the summer, but had an answer to this, which was to bring in president mckinley in september. He would effectively turn things around. Mark and he did, but not in the way margaret he did turn things around, absolutely. Has been a lot of talk is this on . I feel like this was out. Margaret yeah. Mark i will use yours in the meantime. We will go back and forth. So mckinley heralds the opening. F the fair he gives his blessing to the fair, then is tragically killed. I believe there are about two months left in the exhibition at that point, and attendance takes a hit. Dies, and it took eight days for him to die it looked like he was going to come out from it. They were writing about his recovery, everything was great, then things took a turn for the worse and he died pretty put at cast athat pall over the fair in the city of buffalo. What the doctors and surgeons do that some feel was not enough . I will let you answer that. Margaret sure. There was a lot of secondguessing, as you can imagine, and there was some thought that the bullet had been when itmckinleys back mightve been pulled out, and that mightve done the trick, or perhaps there wasnt enough sterilization going on, perhaps they had not closed things properly, but one of the things i did is talk to some trauma surgeons today and asked them to take a look at the case and see whether it might have been possible, and they said even today with imaging and antibiotics that it wouldve been tough, and the problem was been blowns had apart a bit, some poisonous , so he probably couldnt recover back then, but there was this moment that buffalo believed it had done something really miraculous, and it gave rise to not only the sense of relief, but also the belief that buffalo would now be the , therary Nations Capital cabinet be set up in the buffalo club. It was this amazing moment, again, of relief and exhilaration, then all of a sudden, within a few hours, things taken downturn. The president had been asking for cigars, and all of a sudden he cant eat the toast, and what is going on . They pull everything out, strychnine, brandy, did everything they possibly can to him to help stimulate his heart, and it doesnt work. That continued to cast a dark spell over the city of buffalo . Margaret well, as some of you sitting here no, i talked on the boston red sox, called the red sox nation, so i became familiar teams. Orts in am not a big believer curses or spells, but possibly some of you are. We have to think back to what possibly could have been done differently with regards to mckinley. You know, aside from the confidence people felt that he was going to recover, and that included people like the Vice President , teddy roosevelt, i cant find any fault, and i also think that buffalo has paid a big price for any sends it might have committed in the 20th century. Buffalo is on the upswing. Time is about to come, and i dont think we can look back at mckinley. Mark we would just blame ryan, how is that . Ryan, how is that . Just aw up in buffalo short distance from the footprint of the panamerican exhibition. You told me you never really knew much about buffalos history. You to want to research the panamerican exhibition . Margaret i wanted to make up a story how is a child i wandered around fordham drive, the days long ago, and i love history from the very beginning, but that would be a total lie. I majored in english. I dont think i took a history course until after college, so , iwas a number of years ago was teaching on 19th century ericca, and i find larsons novel, and it talked , the this amazing effort worlds fair, the white city that was so magnificent and so influential, and at that point i was looking for a good story to tell, and it came to me that there might be another fair that had some drama associated with buffalo came back to , and began to dig around thanks also to mark goldman who helped me with a lot of this research, discovered all sorts eccentric characters that ,rovided the public with some not necessarily comic relief, but distracted him of the misery of the assassination, and they also spoke to some of the themes , in that they all resisted or opposed or offered a rebuttal to some of the themes of supremacy and domination that had been. Xpressed by the directors drawnyour research is from newspaper accounts of the date, along with memoirs, legal and medical records scholarly literature, that has to be serenely challenging. Done that iso well cant imagine how much work it took to cobble that together and translated to the average person in a way that was compelling and entertaining. Margaret i was so happy when i turned on my computer one day allwent to discover that the panamerican scrapbooks had been digitized. I was flabbergasted. This made things so much easier. It was a long drive. It was challenging. Some of the newspapers took pride in making up fantastic stories, and others took pride in checking facts, so i had to navigate through the evidence, and it was challenging. Mark im going to ask two more questions. Im going to ask everyone to think about what questions they might ask. Of the the legacy panamerican exhibition . It has been 115 years. Margaret i think it is time for us to think beyond mckinley. Man, but important think it is time to think about what else it meant and what else it represented. I think it was a pretty impressive accomplishment, but we can also point to the event that i write about that speaks resistance and struggle for social justice, fair treatment of animals,acial progress and equality they did not get started in buffalo, but the fair gave him a window, an opportunity to be theyssed, challenged, and mark the beginnings of a conversation about social justice that went on and continued to go on to this day. So get youruestion, questions ready. The panamerican exposition occurred at a time when we werent a globally interconnected world, and worlds fairs were one of the know ways for the world to what other societies were doing. Is there still a role for worlds fairs . Should the United States be in kazakhstan in 2017 . Margaret why not . Up anddone some looking exploring why we dont have worlds fairs and talk to people who said, well, the olympics take the place of worlds fairs, or disney world takes the place certainly of the midway, for instance, and they also say, well, you have the worldwide web. Effectively that functions as a world fair that global lysis communication and gives everybody an opportunity to visit other places and experience and explore and communicate with other people, so in a sense, i guess, there are many reasons why we dont have the events. They are very risky for Business Enterprises and the investors, obviously, but it would be great if we did. It would be nice if buffalo did. His again we have such enterprise and optimism lately, if it were to do something again, there is a great opportunity for explaining to the country in the world what buffalo is and what buffalo has become, and the resilience of the city, which has never ceased to impress me. [applause] mark if anybody wants to start a petition to get the worlds fair in buffalo all right, are there any questions people would like to ask . I would do my best to hear the questions. Go ahead. Was, you talked about social justice, would you say word about women . Margaret the panamerican fair offered a vision of the proper place that pretty much everyone, and that included women. Im going to speak particularly point. E women at this it had a board of women managers in a womens building that was elite,much used by for tealass women, s and receptions, so the fair makers word defining them as cultivated and so forth. One of the stories i tell is about andy taylor in the way she taylors this annie and the way she disrupts this. She is a wild woman. She crossed the continent eight times, and there she is with her barrel heading down the niagara river, so there is a story about women there, and what i dont discuss enough, and i would love it if somebody pursued this is particularlywomen, africanamerican, immigrant women working at the fair or who wanted to visit the fair but did not have enough resources to do so, so there are more stories to be told. Mark why dont you talk about mary . Exhibit on blacks were called need rose then, so it is the Negro League Exhibit . Talbert was a very accomplished africanamerican activist who took great offense at the idea that africanAmerican History would be represented by the old bringtion, so she helped to buffalo this remarkable in 1900 to the paris exhibition, and it was in a building, and it exhibited the accomplishments of africanamerican since emancipation. Receivedem was that it little press in local papers, and it wasnt until the time of this and to neil, when people were doing so Much Research in town that people realized this atibit had actually been this fair, so she had done terrific work, but it did not get the attention then that it deserved. Mark yes, sir . Question i believe was can you talk about the architectural legacy of the buildings . Ok. Margaret i am not sure i can do that. The others who have explored the art and architecture of the fair in remarkable books have spoken of the distinction between the architecture at this fair, which was missionstyle, spanish renaissance, as opposed to the architecture of chicagos white city, which was neoclassical. Decision toout that ,ut in a much more fanciful rainbowcolored city, but in terms of the legacy, there is a andsaid about chicago chicagos world fair and its legacy in terms of launching modern urban planning and so forth. I am not sure i could make claims like that for this fair. They are honoring spanishstyle architecture, when the United States is doing its best to shoo away spain from the western hemisphere. That is another story. Mark yes . The question was, it was a statement, the racial insensitivity was very troubling. Was this viewed as the white mans burden . Margaret absolutely. Well, theres notion is a celebration of the fact , civilized white folks had been able to contain native americans on this continent, and now were addressing people like filipinos and becoming more civilized through tutorials and so forth, so there was a sense that this is an obligation on the part of reform,ople to educate,. Nd possibly to eliminate mark yes . I think i got it. Ok. I think i can paraphrase what he asked, basically a lot of the exploitation of exhibits on the midway were not part of the panamerican exhibition per se, is that correct . Right. But they were happening on the midway. Maybe you can explain the difference between the midway and the rest of the fair . Margaret the midway was a milelong stretch of the fair on its side that was concessions range from infant incubator exhibits to trained wild animal shows, to restaurants, to all sorts of different, you know, shows and spectacular sites, but i would not go so far as to say that all the commentary about race and supremacy was located on the midway. I think the midway echoes some of the commentary that was made on the esplanade, near the fountains, and so forth. And when we think about the color scheme of the fair, thats talking about civilization in the same way, certainly anthropology exhibits may make some of the same remarks as well, also we have to remember that people love to go see the midway. They would dutifully go see the major exhibit halls but they rarely missed the midway, soak in terms of influence we have to look hard at that part of the fair. Mark margaret, thank you very much. Margaret thank you, mark. Mark thank you, audience. Mark and margaret, thank you so much. I hope that gives you a teaser to go purchase the book. It makes a Great Holiday gift. We will find a nice warm spot. Thank you for putting up with the chilly night. Margaret was the one who gave me 2012,le in an article in of thank you. [applause] margaret thank you for coming out. That was great. So good. Thank you. That was perfect. Bookshelf history features that best writers of the past decade talking about their books. You can watch our weekly series every saturday at 4 00 p. M. Eastern here on cspan3. What is your vision in 2020 . Studentsam is asking come up what issues you want to see president ial candidates address . Competition for h 100,000 inh 100 cash prizes. Students are asked to produce a video that reflects differing points of view. Information to help you get started is on our website, studentcam. Org. Announcer u. S. And french soldiers liberated paris after more than four years of german occupation. Next on American History tv, chronicles the occupation and liberation of paris. Good evening. Of the Public Affairs team at the public library. We are thrilled to have harry laver as our speaker. We have been partnering with them, and our programs get more and more popular. Are in oursee, we brandnew chairs because we cannot fit you off upstairs. [applause] it doesnt matter the topic