Louisiana Purchase Exposition Souvenir Tray, Alphonse and Gaston
date: label: Date made
content: 1904
name: label: Associated Name
content: Opper, Frederick Burr
notes: label: Description
content: Souvenir tray, possibly for pins, commemorating the Louisiana Purchase Exposition held in St. Louis, Missouri in 1904. The tray features Frederick Burr Opper's characters <i>Alphonse and Gaston </i> The tray features a comic panel of the two characters before the bedside of a "waiting" woman.It is inscribed. "SOUVENIR OF [/] ST.LOUIS WORLD'S FAIR [/] WAITING [/] GO AHEAD, MY DEAR ALPHONSE [/] AFTER YOU, MY DEAR GASTON [/] 1904."
label: Description
content: In 1904 a World’s Fair was held in St. Louis, Missouri to commemorate the 100th anniversary of “The Louisiana Purchase”, a land deal with the French that greatly expanded the boundaries of the United States. Between April and December, over 19.5 million visitors attended the Fair, hosted on a 1,270-acre site constructed at the city’s Forest Park as well as the Washington University campus. While the Exposition presented advances in technology and the arts and sciences, it is remembered today for its racist and dehumanizing displays of living foreign peoples. The Exposition also served as the site of the 1904 Olympic Games, the first ever held in the United States.
label: Description
content: Opper's <i>Alphonse and Gaston </i> comic strip first appeared in newspapers in 1901. The two Frenchmen, one short and one tall, were presented as being comically polite, always deferring to one another.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Missouri, St. Louis
label: Associated Place
content: United States: Missouri, Saint Louis
topic: label: Subject
content: Expositions and Fairs
label: Subject
content: Comics
label: Subject
content: Humor
label: Subject
content: Souvenirs
label: related event
content: Louisiana Purchase Exposition
setName: label: See more items in
content: Culture and the Arts: Entertainment
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: The Larry Zim World's Fair Collection
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1989.0438.1096
label: catalog number
content: 1989.0438.1096
label: accession number
content: 1989.0438
label: catalog number
content: 1904SW02
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Pin Tray
label: Object Name
content: tray
physicalDescription: label: Measurements
content: overall: 3 1/8 in x 4 3/4 in x 1/8 in; 7.9375 cm x 12.065 cm x .3175 cm