Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-08-24
AN ARMY At WORK.
The Columbian Fair Build
ings at Last Assume
Definite Shape.
A PLACE FOR PITTSBURG.
The Iron City Expected to Fill Big
Space in Machinery Hall.
PLANS on A STARTLING SCOPE.
Women to Take an Active Part, With
Building of Their Own.
A PLACE FOR PITTSBURG.
PLANS on A STARTLING SCOPE.
Women to Take an Active Part, With a
Building of Their Own.
A BUILDING IN THE SHAPE OF A SHIP

ESPECIAL CORRESPONDENCE OF THE DISPATcH.1
CHICAGO, Aug. 2S.-"Al you see of the
Worlds Fair is six miles of board fence
That's what the wild waves are sayingr'
So sang Eddie Foy in ''Sinbad' at the
Chicago Opera House last night, and as far
as the general public is concerned it is true
jackson Park, where the bulk of the great
show IS to be located, is surrounded with a
fence higher, tighter, stronger and more
zealously guarded than the fence around
the Allegheny Ball Park.
The cracks are so small that even the
enterprising small boy could scarcely peep
through. 1t is so smooth that even the
young man who has caught the creased pig
at the county fair would find his hands
full in trying to get over it. The
gates are built apparently with
view to great durability and are closely
guarded, nobody being allowed to enter
without a permit. About four weeks ago,
when the work on some of the buildings got
fairly under way, the policy of excluding
outsiders was put into practice, largely
with view of keeping out men who might
make trouble among the workmen, and the
results have been very satisfactory to all
ness within the enclosure
A SCENE OF ACTIVITY
Within the enclosure scene of great ac-
tivity presents itself About 600 men are
at work converting the big stretch of prairie
swamp into a garden of art and industry,
whose attractions shall astonish the world.
AT the edge of the lake a powerful steam
dredge is at work, the great shovel slips
a nd oF IL !
a moment later comes laboriously TO the
surface with half cartioad of sand drip
pling over its edge.
The sand is emptied into a barge and
down goes the shovel again. Each day the
dredge works its way farther inland 1t is
cutting the broad water passage, which the
architects of the Exposition call the great
basin, and by which Lake Michigan is to COM
municate with the system of artificial water
ways with which the park is to be beauti-
fed and diversified as well as by the build
ings. The channels within the park do not
need to wait for the dredge. Then resort is
had TO the patient mule and his equally do
eile italian driver, the temporary railway
and to the spade and the scraper The La
goon, with its four miles of winding shore,
with its wooded island" and its other isl
and that is not to be wooded, but is to be the
location of the Fisheries Building, is fast
taking shape. The spaces to be occupied by
the various buildings have long since been
marked out, cleared and leveled. In all
but one or two instances the con-
tracts have been let, and great double
carloads of timbers have been
passed through the gates for their founda-
tions. The scene throughout that portion
of Jackson Park to be occupied by the
Fair is one of great activity, but the Wis
itor who goes without first having studied
plan of the buildings is very apt to come
away with a confused idea of what is being
done.
LOOKING TO THE WEST.
In the bird's-eye view of the Exposition
the observer is supposed to be looking west
from Lake Michigan. Right in the fore
ground is feature that above all others
will be appreciated by visitors from interior
States, and that is the great pier stretching
1900 feet out into the lake and affording
place of shelter for hundreds of small
pleasure crafts. 1t is a remarkable fact
that in all the % miles of Chi
cago's lake front no similar accom-
mediation for the lover of boating is
to be found. He must climb over half
dozen dangerous railway tracks before he
reaches the water, and then avail himself
ofthe services of a boatman. The Fair will
afford the most ample and accessible accom-
modations, and no visitor need go away
without at least a taste Of life in the rolling
waves of Chicago's great lake 1t exists