Landscape historian Barbara Geiger spoke to a standing-room-only crowd Thursday night on the North Shore roots of the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair.
Geiger’s talk, “The Devil Comes to Wilmette,”centered on the events and characters in Erik Larson’s “The Devil in the White City,” a historical account of the fair’s planning, construction and execution. More than 130 people attended the event at the Evanston History Center, 225 Greenwood St.
She began by introducing the key players: Daniel Burnham, Fair architect and c0-author of the Plan of Chicago of 1909; John Wellborn Root, his business partner; Frederick Law Olmsted, the Fair’s landscape architect and the “Devil,” H.H. Holmes, a serial killer who targeted women visiting the Fair.
Though Geiger touched briefly on Holmes’ story, she focused most of her talk on Burnham, Root and Olmsted.
“We will begin his story and end his story and then go on to nice people,” she said, prompting laughter from the audience.
Though Geiger focused on the same events chronicled in Larson’s book, she added more information about what happened before and after Larson’s timeline. She also emphasized the characters’ local connections, such as Holmes’ house in Wilmette and Burnham’s house in Evanston, located at the intersection of Dempster Street and Forest Avenue. Other notable locals were also discussed, including Frances Willard, the second president of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union and namesake of Northwestern’s Willard Residential College.
“I liked that she gave a little more information than was in the book,” said Leslie Mackin, a History Center member who attended with friends. “She did a nice job of continually tying it back to the North Shore.”
Geiger’s talk was part of the History Center’s Under the Buffalo lecture series, named for the stuffed buffalo head that hangs in the Great Hall.
“We always look for really good speakers and try to draw in people from various backgrounds,” said Jenny Thompson, curator of education for the History Center. “We get historians, artists, writers, a wide range.”
Thompson said she was struck by the evening’s turnout, a possible record for the center. Attendee Kathleen Long was also impressed by the number of people at the lecture.
“To have such a huge crowd in the middle of January is amazing,” she said.
Though the Under the Buffalo lectures are not always centered around Evanston, many attendees appreciated the local emphasis of Geiger’s talk.
“That’s what our neighbors accomplished! Isn’t that amazing?” Geiger said about the locality of the subject.
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