This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1917 Excerpt: …ending at the tower, which unfolded and illustrated the plan, purposes, and objects of the Exposition, not as a miscellaneous mass of buildings and exhibits, but as an inherent revelation of the development and various forms of energy and activity of the Western Hemisphere. 1 And Bitter himself has left a very detailed description of his plan,3 from which it is plain that Mr. Milburn correctly caught his meaning and that he aimed, above all, at an organic composition. Accordingly, he developed a sculptural scheme which, while fully expressing the underlying idea of the Exposition, was intended to realize a significant, beautiful, and harmonized decoration. The execution of the various parts he left to the co-operating sculptors, who were expected to assume full responsibility for their respective contributions. For, be it understood, if Bitter was the director, the completed work was to be nothing less than the evidence, spread before the country, of the level of achievement reached by the brotherhood of sculptors in America at the dawn of the twentieth century. If, putting ourselves in the director’s position, we now proceed to inquire what was the scheme worked out by the architects and submitted to Bitter for decorative treatment, we discover that there were buildings in groups around majestic courts and along splendid thoroughfares, and that while some served to display the resources of Nature, such as forest and mineral wealth, others celebrated Man in respect of his moral and social development, and still others proclaimed Man’s inventive genius, by virtue of which he has attacked the rich stores of Nature and reduced them to his service. Thus there were three main architectural groups, and in order to echo and reaffirm the meaning inherent in ea…
