Arizona republican., 1894-01-07
WORLDS FAIR PADS.
The Rage for Collecting Souvenirs
 of the Great Exposition.
One Woman Who Even Economical on Her Meals in Order to Gratify Her Desire for Colum-
 bian Curios.

An epidemic of fads has set in as a direct result of the worlds fair. Peo- pie who had held out long and stoutly against the temptation to ''collect'' things came under the spell at the White City, says the New York Sun.
 A critical analysis of the fad fever has yet to be written. It is contracted in various ways. It is with fads as it is with greatness Some people are born with fads, some acquire them, and others have fads thrown upon them. Of this last variety are the peo- pie who have, by chance perhaps, re- ceived a present or presents, which have subtly inspired them with the mania for acquiring other things of the same nature. In this way, for exam pie, many fine and otherwise admir- able young woman has, by the gift of perhaps a single silver spoon, been transformed into one of the spoon fends who have been at once such try ing, and yet such pathetic, figures dur ing the past few years.
 Other people acquire fads. They "take them up." These are the people who have more money than they have tastes. They gratify their small lik- ings without exhausting their ''spend- ing money" so to speak, and they 'take up'' fad for teapots, or fans, or, in general anything that they have heard some one else is collecting.
 And there are the born faddists. They are the people who have a single strong fancy or love for something. The man who collects musical instru- ments because he cannot help it prob ably loved them when he was a baby, and the real bibliomaniac doubtless never had to be reproved when he was an infant for tearing the leaves of his picture books.
 But the exposition faddists were ere ated in still another way. They are the creatures of circumstances. Never were such opportunities for collecting curiosities presented to the American public before. It is not strange that the victims have been many. Some times the merest trifes laid down the law of the coming fad. For instance, two New York girls, were passing along the Court of Honor, in front of the Agricultural building. All the white facades gleamed in the sunlight, and a troop of Navajo -dians crossing the court looked so picturesque that they soon had crowd around them. The two girls pressed through the peo- gle till they reached the center of the group, where they suddenly became lost in admiration of leather quiver full of arrows worn by one of the h. dians. They priced it at once. The sum named was so fabuleusly large that they relinquished the quiver with a sigh. But each girl purchased an ar row. And, of course, those arrows were exhibited at the Clearinghouse that night with the remark that they were purchased from Ia real Indian!"
 The next day the same young women were at the Javanese village, when their eyes fell upon some more arrows. In weak moment they yielded, and a Javanese arrow, bought from a real Javanese," was placed with the Navajo weapon. That settled it. Dahomey- ans, South Sea Islanders, Japanese. Chinese, every nation which boasted an arrow, contributed a specimen, and now those two girls are rabid collect orS.
 A list of the fads which sprung into life and were nourished into vigor at the fair would be amusing enough. One woman who began as mere joke, to purchase two or three of the ''souven- irs'' which were for sale in almost infinite variety, finally became such a full-f1edged collector, that she econo- mixed on meals, walked instead of rode, and finally took a cheaper room in order to make her souvenir collec- tion as complete as possible. She had nothing which did not bear the words: Columbian Exposition" or: Worlds Fair" or some other reference to the fair. Everything, from little red glass es with the name engraved while you wait," silk handkerchiefs with a picture of Columbus woven in them also while you wait," to canes con- taining maps of the grounds, souvenir coins and models of the buildings, were put into a collection which is really most interesting one, although Of scarcely any intrinsic value.