page_title: United States Sanitary Commission
section_title: Sanitary Fairs
hierarchical_section_title: United States Sanitary Commission / Sanitary Fairs
context_page_description: The United States Sanitary Commission was a private relief agency created by federal legislation on June 18, 1861, to support sick and wounded soldiers of the United States Army during the American Civil War. It operated across the North, raised an estimated $25 million in Civil War era revenue and in-kind contributions to support the cause, and enlisted thousands of volunteers. The president was Henry Whitney Bellows, and Frederick Law Olmsted acted as executive secretary. It was modeled on the British Sanitary Commission, set up during the Crimean War, and from the British parliamentary report published after the Indian Rebellion of 1857.
context_section_description: From the outset, many local groups sponsored fund-raising events to benefit the Commission. As the war progressed these became larger and more elaborate. In February of 1863, the women of Lowell, Massachusetts, organized a two-day "Mammoth Fair" occupying two exhibition halls and netting over four thousand dollars for the cause. Groups in other cities soon adopted this plan. Organizing these Sanitary Fairs offered ways for local communities to be directly part of supporting the war effort of the nation. The largest Sanitary Fair during the war was held in Chicago from October 27 to November 7, 1863. Called the Northwestern Soldiers' Fair, it raised almost $100,000 for the war effort. It included a six-mile-long parade of militiamen, bands, political leaders, delegations from various local organizations, and a contingent of farmers, who presented carts full of their crops. Chicago's Northwestern Soldiers' Fair included a "Curiosity Shop" of war souvenirs and Americana. Its organizers intended its displays of weapons, slavery artifacts and other items to illustrate for Union visitors the contrast between the "barbaric" Southern enemy and the "civilized" North. The fairs generally involved large-scale exhibitions, including displays of art, mechanical technology, and period rooms. These sorts of displays called upon ideas of the American past, a history that local communities held in common. Often, different communities competed with each other over their donations to the national cause. People in various cities and towns across the North contributed to the same war effort because they identified as having shared fortunes in their common nation.
  The USSC leadership sometimes did not approve of the excitement and lavishness of the fairs. They wanted to encourage sacrifice as a component of membership in a nation. Although the fairs were one way to create a national identity which might motivate citizens to perform their duties, the commission leadership did not want the fairs to become the focus of USSC work.
  Chicago held a second sanitary fair from April 27, 1865 to June 21, 1865 and the women organizers published a newspaper entitled Voice of the Fair that was distributed at the event.
caption: Stereoscopic image of the picture gallery at the Metropolitan Fair of 1864 held in New York State
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