EXHIBITION FIASCO

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 22 January 1927, Page 9

EXHIBITION FIASCO

♦ PHILADELPHIA’S MILLION LOSS BY CABLE —PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT. NEW YORK, Jan. 20. The closing of Philadelphia’s Sesquieentennial Exposition reveals that the enterprise has been a colossal failure, owing first to national Indifference, and secondly, it is alleged, to graft, politics, and mismanagement. The exposition cost £4,000,0p0, and the loss to Philadelphia will exceed £1,000,000. Conceived as a dignified national memorial commemorating 150 years of American independence, the fair failed to attract more than 5,000,000 visitors, whore 50,000,000 were expected. Tne offiaial excuse is that people are tired of exhibitions, and the city is determined that there shall be no repetition of the sad business next year. Many sections of the exhibition grounds and buildings were never completed, and foreign Governments and exhibitors, after spending large sums of money, found the buildings unfinished and no place for their exhibits. The exposition, the greatest ever undertaken in this country, was dosigned to make a strong patriotic appeal, but in this sense also the entire project proved a dismal failure.