THE ST. LOUIS EXHIBITION.

Wanganui Herald, Volume XXXIX, Issue 11475, 4 February 1905, Page 4

THE ST. LOUIS EXHIBITION.

Ik the course' of a : thoughtful and interesting retrospect ' of ' the ' St. Louis Exhibition, the special- correspondent of The Times expresses the opinion that it is probably the last attempt -that will be,. made in America to celebrate any [ great act by a ..universal exhibition, and that it.,is not likely- that, any- Contributors will ever come forward* "*agajn ' to ''furnish ! for this kind of display sucli a .eurii as was necessary for, this exhibition. Examining the causes of the ''conspicuous failure" of the exhibition in' many respects, the correspondent observes that the people of St. Louis are: not "an active, entering} money-spending people like those oi Chicago." The purely local interest, in the exhibition was slight fr<?m the opening days, and it attracted - only the . slightest interest in the PreesJ '"It 'would '-probably .be safe to say '• that three times/'as'much. matter of a- serious character; has- been published aboiit the exhibition ,in the press oi^ London as in New York and Philadelphia." It , -was. ■ estimated that . the .exhibition would ' attract not fewer than 30,000,000 visitors, and in many quarters .the. estimates were much, j higher, but so far as could be determined wh,en the correspondent wrote, the attendance, rat St. Louis waa'onjy 14,000,000. -At '(Dhicagc — a much smaller exhibition— *the attendance was about 28;000,000. "But" perhaps the strongest influence that' has been at work," says the' coi'respttndent, '"is. the conscious recognition of ,the" fact.^that great exhibitions .have .be^n overdone,' -. and that they no longer, have a direct, or -even an indirect, value compared with those' held in earlier "days." ' There is a strong feeling, too, that such exhibitions are used to push the , fortunes of ambitious ; ,mcn, "otherwise uninteresting -or 1 unsuccessful," this being true in spite of the '"fact, that some of the men connected with .the man-

agement of the . exhibition have . done a great deal of worlc under many difficulties. Tt is also felt that "the* occasion itSelf was not so uncommon or so important as- to attract general attention." The Louisiana purchase was, of course, a very important event in the . history •of America, biit'as it merely marked • the • continuation of^.a policy, and was 'only the = largest -of. r many like acquisitions, the imagination of the country was not excited by it as it was' by such an occasions as the fourth centennial of the discovery, of America. - The end ' of the exhibition has been welcomed by "more people than was its opening. , .Failnfe was largely due to the fact; that a "gjcat.'jleai more was -.under taken than ought s to-'have been!" ;..■,-.