Photographs of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, 1915

Summary

Creators:

Cardinell-Vincent Company

Abstract:

The Photographs of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition collection contains 31 photographic prints of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition taken by the Cardinell-Vincent Company, the official photographers of the Exposition.

Extent:

31 photographic prints, 36 x 27 cm. or smaller; 1 photomechanical reproduction of painting, mounted, 25 x 36 cm. 32 digital objects

Language:

Collection materials are in English

Background

Scope and content:

The Photographs of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition collection contains 31 photographic prints of the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition taken by the Cardinell-Vincent Company, the official photographers of the Exposition. Attractions of the Exposition featured in the collection include the Palace of Fine Arts, the Tower of Jewels, the Court of the Universe, the Court of Abundance, the Court of Four Seasons, the Court of Palms, Festival Hall, and the Italian Pavilion, as well as various paintings and sculptural works. Architects, sculptors and painters whose work is featured in the collection include Bernard Maybeck, A. Stirling Calder, Thomas Hastings, George W. Kelham, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, James Earle Fraser, Edward Berge, Robert I. Aitken, Louis Christian Mullgardt, Daniel Chester French, Arthur F. Mathews, Adolph A. Weinman, Robert Farquhar, Frank Brangwyn, Henry Bacon, and Albert Jaeger.

Several of the prints are hand-colored. The collection also includes a mounted color photomechanical reproduction of an Exposition painting.

Biographical / historical:

The Panama-Pacific International Exposition (P.P.I.E.), held in 1915 in San Francisco, commemorated the opening of the Panama Canal in July of that year and sought to display to the world the recovery of San Francisco from the devastating earthquake and fire of 1906. Conceived as early as 1904, the extravagant P.P.I.E. covered circa 300 acres along the picturesque bayside Marina district of San Francisco. Temporary palaces, towers, gardens, fountains and miscellaneous attractions were constructed, creating a diverse yet harmonious "city of domes," which combined Spanish and Italian baroque designs with those of Byzantium and the Orient. In addition to inviting nations from all over the world to erect buildings and exhibits on the grounds, the P.P.I.E. also employed a distinguished array of architects, sculptors, painters and other artisans to develop the design of the larger palaces and courts. The Exposition was held from February 4 to December 4, and attracted circa 19 million visitors. The only original structure remaining on site from the Exposition is Bernard Maybeck's Palace of Fine Arts, which was restored in the 1960s. The California Palace of the Legion of Honor, built in 1924 at San Francisco's Land's End, is a replica of France's palace of the same name, which was originally replicated for the P.P.I.E. as the French Pavilion.

Acquisition information:

Unknown.

Rules or conventions:

Finding Aid prepared using Describing Archives: a Content Standard

Location of this collection:

UC Berkeley, Bancroft Library

University of California, Berkeley, The Bancroft Library

Berkeley, CA 94720-6000, US

Contact:

510-642-6481

bancref-library@berkeley.edu

Website