1:1. Opened midnight, December 31, 1914 and closed December 31, 1915; attendance for year about 2 million; record by months given; highest attendance for any one month was 301,937 for July.

1:1-7, 2:4. Finest exhibits of northern Exposition secured; Committee overwhelmed with offers, selects best collections only.

Visitors to the Panama-California International Exposition at San Diego during the year 1916 will see the cream of the exhibits that were at San Francisco last year --- new exhibits that were at neither of the expositions, and an entirely new arrangement of some of the exhibits that were shown at the San Diego Exposition in 1915.

First in importance and extent are the United States government exhibits --- they covered 197,000 square feet of space at San Francisco. More than a week was spent by the San Diego exhibits committee in going over this great exhibit, scattered as it was through all the buildings of the Exposition --- in an effort to make a selection of those things that best suit the needs here and are most interesting from the visitor’s point of view. Such a selection was made.

From the navy department are some of the most interesting guns --- new models of field pieces like those now used in the European war --- models of famous ships and the wonderful panorama that so excited Secretary Daniels, a revolving perspective --- a lighted model frame containing every ship that ever flew the American flag as a vessel of war. The Bonhomme Richard, flagship of John Paul Jones leads, and from her are inclined all the ships down to the very latest, the wonderful California super dreadnought. Spectators stand before it and with apparent ease pick out this and that famous ship, even to our own good cruiser San Diego. There is a large amount of extremely interesting material in this section. Supplementing this exhibit, the old battleship Oregon will be anchored in the bay probably most of the year.

Federal Progress Shown

Treasury exhibits include those showing the mints and the progress in the care of public health; those from the war department, the most approved methods of destroying life by military operations. The war department exhibit will include a new six-inch howitzer, made in the United States, an exact counterpart of the deadly guns so much used in Germany; a great tank showing submarine mines and the method of blowing up a ship; tanks showing the dry docks and the method of docking vessels; shells of all sizes; solid shot and armor plate with holes punched clean through it; working models of the great dredges and docks at Pearl Harbor and elsewhere; wonderful lighted panoramas of famous battles; and last, but by no means least, a complete cartridge-making plant, one that turns our cartridges as fast as two men can pack them.

From the department of commerce come the different styles of wonderful lighthouse lenses, all operated by electricity. The first light ever shown on the Pacific coast, the latest wonder that is to be installed at Galveston are in this collection and the two gun, such as are used in life saving, and a number of other most interesting exhibits are included.

Indian Work Displayed

The department of the interior sends a wealth of material pertaining to the management of Uncle Sam’s vast domain, not the least interesting of which is a complete arts and crafts section showing the work of boys and girls in Indian schools of the country, and giving opportunity to see the progress of the Indian race by comparing this exhibit with the archaeological exhibit already installed at our Exposition.

Agricultural department exhibits include the absorbing weather bureau apparatus --- the new forestry department, the great collection of harmful patent medicines with their analyses, to say nothing of the complete results of Dr. Wylie’s quarter century of work and investigation; the soil investigations of the department, the plant investigations, all the bugs ever heard or dreamed of, and their use and disuse are shown; the animal industry section, the biological survey --- in fact, so many things of an interesting character are included that it is impossible to enumerate them.

Each of the government departments contributes the most interesting features of its departmental work --- selected by the committee --- so that the visitor in 1916 will not be compelled to go over the whole of the Exposition to see it all, nor to see it all in hunting those things most interesting to him.

Roads Exhibit Promised

As a feature, Professor Bramson-Scribner, chairman of the government exhibit board, is bringing the wonderful good roads exhibit, with its models showing roads from the famous old Appian Way to the boulevards of San Diego County and the other paved roads of California. Another wonderful feature is the fisheries’ exhibit, which, if the fishes can be gathered again, will be installed here.

Chief among the foreign exhibits is the big Canadian display --- a collection that has been brought together by years of effort and has been shown in nearly every quarter of the world. All embracing, it covers the Dominion of Canada from Saint Johns, N. F., to Price Rupert, from the Arctic Ocean to Winnipeg. Nothing has been unimportant and nothing too important for the use of this exhibit. It occupied one of the largest buildings at the San Francisco Exposition, and will be housed here in the great Commerce and Industries Building.

Next in magnitude to the Canadian exhibit is that of France.

This exhibit is a wonderful collection of art works, relics of famous French men, personal things they used --- tapestries of the wonderful Gobelin weave, paintings, sculptures, and all the wonderfully beautiful things the most artistic nation in the world could gather in one exhibit to be shipped out of the country. The United States government sent a war vessel to carry this exhibit from France to the United States, and will return it to France in like manner. If the complete exhibit comes here, it will be housed in the California and the Fine Arts Buildings. The value of the tapestries and relics, art works and specimens is estimated at more then 7,000,000 francs.

Art Works Wonderful

The Italian exhibit will consist almost entirely of art works, sculptures and paintings, beautiful marbles, most exquisite carvings, gold, silver and silk work, bronzes and plasters. The catalogue of one exhibitor who is coming here is a large book in itself, the illustrations in which are works of art. Other Italian exhibits are from the Turin and Rome expositions of 1911 and are very complete and interesting.

Netherlands will send a very complete exhibit, including paintings and the quaint Dutch forms of art that have been preserved through hundreds of years of changing fashions and conceptions of art work in other countries. Netherlands made a very complete horticultural exhibit at San Francisco, the flowers of which will come here.

In point of size, the Pan-Pacific exhibit comes next. This includes material from Australian, New Zealand, Borneo, Sumatra, Java, the islands of Oceanica, the Philippines, China, Japan, Hawaii and all the other great nations living on the shores of the Pacific Ocean. The wonderful fisheries exhibit of Hawaii will be included. For variety of exhibits, the Pan-Pacific group is unsurpassed by any single exhibiting nation.

Cutlery to be Exhibited

Germany will be here with a very comprehensive exhibit of manufactures, textiles and metals, including the wonderful Haenkel cutlery exhibit.

Among others are Russia, Switzerland, some Japanese and Chinese art exhibits, Mexico, Spain --- with a wonderful collection of art and manufactures --- and several of the countries of Central and South America. Dr. Dahne has just returned from Brazil with an enlarged exhibit.

Half a dozen commissioners of foreign countries are awaiting permission from their respective governments to come, they having recommended that their exhibits be shown here.

As to the domestic or so-called commercial exhibits, the committee made a selection of less than 20 from the entire San Francisco Exposition, the idea being to invite only moving or process exhibits to take part this year. Among these are Ridgeway’s Tea Company, Simmons Hardware Company, with its wonderfully complex cutlery exhibit, Herter Looms Company, with its silk weaving machinery, Niagara Maid Company, the Gantner-Matter silk thread reeling machinery and weaving looms, the Fearn Company, with its silk-weaving machinery, Oregon City Woolen Mills Company, Belding Brothers silk culture, Baker’s Cocoa, Quaker Oats Company, Stollwerk Company, Lyon and Raas glace [sic] fruit exhibit, Rosenblatt Brothers, with their wine fountain, Standard Felt Company, Cadillac Motor Car Company, Ford Motor Car Company, with an assembling plant, and _______ of like interest.

Poor Exhibits Excluded

The problem has not been to secure exhibits, but to keep from taking a lot of exhibits that would prove uninteresting. Some of the old exhibitors will stay will newly arranged exhibits, and the commercial section of the Exposition, simply will be more interesting than at San Francisco or any other exposition.

Some of the foreign exhibits already have arrived and are warehouses, some are en route, and some are being packed for shipment. The great government exhibit was brought here on the collier Mars, which vessel is carrying the United States government exhibit to Panama.

President Davidson, Secretary Penfold, Mayor Capps, and I. G. Lewis passed many days in San Francisco selecting the exhibits wanted and arranging for their transportation here and, if interest by spectators as shown at San Francisco is any criterion, when assembled the exhibits will surpass anything shown in this country. As an evidence of the care taken in this selection, it may be stated that from the entire Zone at San Francisco, only three concessions were invited to come here, and from the great manufactures building only three exhibitors were invited.

1:7-8, 6:4. Twin celebrations usher in New Year and 1916 Exposition; trains and boats pour visitors into city; plans for coming 12 months assure great prosperity of Harbor of the Sun.

Combining two great civic celebrations --- that of opening the Panama-California International Exposition and the festivities always in force New Year’s Eve --- thousands of San Diegans and their visitors crowded the Isthmus and its amusement places and Exposition cafes last night.

Hardly less auspicious than the opening of the Fair a year ago, the celebration of last night was another of those highlights in San Diego history by which future time will be marked.

A happy, carefree crowd roamed over the grounds, giving vent to their enthusiasm for the continuance of out Exposition in countless ways.

More than 2,000,000 visitors came to San Diego during 1915. An equal number is expected in 1916. Popular demand and the hearty support of all Southern Californians conspired to keep the Exposition open an additional year. The first year’s Exposition has been held, records have been broken, and San Diego accomplished it practically unaided. It will be the first time in history that an Exposition has been open to the public every day and every evening for two years.

Fair Grounds Alive With Light and Color

As The Union went to press for the annual edition, one great purpose of which is to direct the attention of the nation to the continuance of the Panama-California International Exposition and the future possibilities of Southern California, as well as the more concrete facts of what has been accomplished in the past, the Exposition grounds were alive with light and color. San Diegans and their visitors --- many thousands of them --- were celebrating the passing of the old year and the welcoming of the new --- which gives promise of being the greatest since Balboa landed on the glittering sand of a newly-found empire.

For several days past trains and boats to San Diego have again carried record-breaking loads of passengers. Hotels are filled. A greater number have come from Los Angeles, San Francisco and smaller cities of the state to help San Diegans celebrate the continuation of the Fair. It was largely due to the hearty support and cooperation of these Californians that the continuation of the Exposition was made possible.

Yesterday afternoon a great review of officers and men of marine barracks, the First cavalry and the coast artillery was held at the Plaza de Panama at the Exposition. The review was featured by the presentation of diplomas given the various branches of the military services stationed at San Diego during 1915. President G. A. Davidson made the presentation speeches and highly complimented the men on their loyalty.

Aerial Bombs Discharged

Festivities at the Exposition began at 6 p.m. with the discharge of a volley of aerial bombs and the blowing of the world’s largest siren whistle. The sound of the whistle and the discharge of the bombs were scheduled to continue up to midnight, when there was to be a gathering of all the noise-making devices produced by the ingenuity of man. They were all to be turned loosed at a single minute before midnight and continue several minutes after the birth of the new year.

Admission to the Isthmus, the great white way, or the Joy Street of the Fair, was free to all. Every concessionaire on the street had thrown open his show place to the public free. Staid adults, who have paid strict heed to convention in times gone by, were found riding of the Toad-stool and throwing baseballs at "Kelley." Others were merrily riding over the bumps of the roller coaster or watching hula dancers at the Hawaiian Village.

With all Southern California behind the 1916 venture, with all working as a unit for one purpose --- that of eclipsing 1915 records in 1916 --- the new year promises much for the prosperity of the Southland.

State Exhibits Continued

All the state buildings, with the possible exception of Nevada, will continue their exhibits. All of the exhibits will be augmented by the cream of their exhibits which were shown in San Francisco, which makes certain bigger and better displays at San Diego than during 1915.

Railroads have rallied royally in support of the 1916 Fair and have made heavy contributions in cash and have arranged summer transcontinental rates which will make a visit to the Pacific coast look attractive to Easterners and Middle Westerners. Citizens of Los Angeles, anxious to have the Exposition continued, also have given liberal financial and other support. This also is true of the different California counties, whose exhibits without an exception, will be continued.

The great Canadian exhibit, perhaps the best of the kind ever made at any Exposition, is on its way to San Diego from San Francisco. It will be housed in one of the largest of the main exhibit buildings. Russia will exhibit, as will Italy, and several other countries. While a positive statement cannot be made regarding the French exhibit, it is considered that it also will be a feature of the foreign exhibits.

Government Exhibits On Way

Appropriations from congress, sufficient for the upkeep of the government exhibit shown at San Francisco have been made. The exhibit was packed and shipped several days ago and a great part of it already is here and a corps of workers are busy installing it. The government has also promised to have as many war ships in the harbor during 1916 as possible. The marine camp at the Fair will be continued, as will the cavalry camp, and a camp of infantry is to be established. Each division has its band, which gives promise of many musical treats during the year.

Doctor Humphrey J. Stewart, an organist of fame, brought to San Diego to play the Spreckels open-air pipe organ, the only instrument of its kind in the world, will play daily throughout 1916. The organ was given to the people of San Diego by John D. and A. D. Spreckels.

Shortly after the opening it is expected a new troupe of Spanish troubadours will be engaged, and on every day of the new year the sweet voices of the senoritas and the mellow music of the stringed instruments will be heard in various parts of the grounds. This form of entertainment is conceded to fit perfectly into the romantic Spanish atmosphere of the Exposition, and it elicited as much favorable comment from Eastern visitors as any form of entertainments during the past year.

Many Conventions Secured

Committees of citizens have been busy for some time lining up conventions for 1916. It now looks as though San Diegans will be hosts to at least twenty large conventions before the passing of a twelve month. San Diegans love to play the role of hosts. During 1915 they made themselves popular with representatives of practically every city in the United States.

The Isthmus, the amusement street of the Fair, will also be continued. A solid mile of amusements, many of which have never been shown at any Exposition, will be ready for the entertainment of the visitor. The Painted Desert, the Indian exhibit of the Santa Fe Railroad, will be continued. This exhibit has become known all over the country for its excellence and probably will prove a larger drawing card in 1916 than in the past.

A full attendance of the new executive board of thirty-one members, representing all Southern California, is expected by President G. A. Davidson today, when official ceremonies will take place. Members of boards of supervisors of the various California counties have announced their intention of being present. Governors of all the western states participating have been invited and will probably attend.

Schumann-Heink To Sing

The celebration of today will begin at 10:30 a.m. with a grand military parade, which will start from the foot of Broadway. The parade will march through the principal downtown streets and to the Laurel Street entrance of the Exposition. First will come a battalion of the coast artillery corps, then a battalion of sailors, headed by their band, two companies of the marine corps and band, a squadron of cavalry, two companies of coast artillery corps reserves, division of naval reserves, Army and Navy cadets and band. The official formal ceremonies of the day will follow immediately on the arrival of the parade at the Exposition Plaza de Panama.

Directors of the new Exposition will be hosts to officers of the army and navy at a luncheon to be given at noon at the Cristobal Café. The luncheon will take place immediately after the military and naval pageant. Rear Admiral Fullam, Pacific reserve fleet commander, will review the pageant at the Plaza de Panama with other officers of the army and navy and directors of the Exposition.

Perhaps the greatest appeal of the entire celebration program will be the concert by Mme. Ernestine Schumann-Heink and Mme. Ellen Beach Yaw at the Spreckels Organ Pavilion at 2 o’clock in the afternoon. All seats will be free.

National Magazine, Dayton News, Christian Science Monitor, Review of Reviews, United Presbyterian, Photo-Era, Buffalo News, Philadelphia Inquirer, Saturday Evening Post, Boston Herald, Evanston, Illinois Index, Peoria Journal, Philadelphia Public Ledger, Chicago Post, Boston Journal, Dayton Journal, Peoria (Illinois) Journal, and other newspapers and magazines (note: microfilm of this article is extremely hard to read).

With the Christmas services at the Exposition as its crowning event, the greatest year of music San Diego has known passed into history last night. This afternoon concerts by Madame Schumann-Heink and Madame Ellen Beach Yaw, two singers whose fame covers both continents, will furnish a noteworthy beginning for the 1916 season.

In quality as well as quantity, the music of the year has set a high-water mark for San Diego activities and the educational result has been evidenced in a demand by local music lovers for performances of greater excellence than ever before.

A glance over the artists who have appeared in this city shows it to be almost of metropolitan pretensions: Schumann-Heink, John McCormack, Fritz Kreisler, Marcella Craft, Efram Zimbalist, Florencio Constantino, Ellen Beach Yaw, Mrs. H. H. A. Beach, Carrie Jacobs Bond, George Hamlin, Charles Wakefield Cadman, Alys Larreyne, Julia Culp, Tina Lerner and Cecil Fanning, all names familiar to followers of music in American and Europe and all standing for the highest in the melodic art.

It is difficult for one to realize without having figures at hand how much music San Diego has heard during the past year. The greatest source of musical enjoyment has been the Spreckels organ at the Exposition where 359 (?) regular recitals were given, in the course of which nearly 3,000 selections were played on the noble instrument. Thirty-three outside soloists and ten San Diego soloists appeared at the organ, either in separate recitals or in connection with organ recitals. These do not include the soloists and singers who appeared at the organ in the four performances by the People’s Chorus for the members of the Popular Symphony Orchestra which played on Dedication Night; the members of the San Diego Symphony Orchestra and the San Diego Choral Society in the Ninth Symphony; the singers in the military mass on Catholic Day; nor those of the Ogden Tabernacle Choir, the Haydn Society of Chicago, or the Chicago Sunday Evening Club Choir.

Six musicians were honored by having days at the Exposition named after them, as follows: Schumann-Heink, March 22; Carrie Jacobs Bond, June 1; Mrs. H. A. Beach, June 23; Charles Wakefield Cadman, July 6; Marcella Craft, July 14; and Ellen Beach Yaw, August 24.

Twenty-three San Diegans were soloists at teas held in the women’s headquarters in the California building.

Numerous concerts were given in the Blue Room in the Southern California Counties building, at which many outside and local artists appeared.

Concerts by the bands of the Fourth Marines, U. S. N., and the First Cavalry, U. S. A., were almost daily occurrences throughout the year, and for many months the Exposition has its own band. Visiting bands were the Creatore (?) band, which played an engagement of two weeks; the Australian Boys’ Band, here on week; the famous Kilties Band, here nearly a week; and the Los Angeles Police Band and the Coronado Tent City Band for one day each only.

Three colored quartets, the Tuskegee Singers, the Dixie Singers, and the Hampton Quartet were among the visiting organizations.

In point of attendance and prominence of the artist, the concert given by Madame Schumann-Heink at the Spreckels organ on the night of June 23 easily has first place in the year’s events. More than 25,000 heard the great diva singer. She was assisted in her program by Toni Hoff, accompanist, Dr. Humphrey Stewart, organist, and Mrs. Frieda Foote Chapman, violinist.. Eight thousand children thronged the Plaza de Panama at the Exposition on the afternoon of March 22 to hear the wonderful contralto sing especially for them, and formed a guard of honor for her on her way to the Spreckels organ, where she was presented with the keys to the city and made an honorary citizen of San Diego.

Marcella Craft and Ellen Beach Yaw were two other sopranos whose recitals at the Exposition drew thousands of people, and John McCormack, the noted Irish tenor; Fritz Kreisler, the world’s greatest violinist; and Efram Zimbalist, the Russian violinist; Florencio Constantino, the great Spanish grand opera tenor; George Hamlin, the well-known American tenor; Charles Wakefield Cadman, the pianist and composer of Indian songs with Princess Tsianina Redfeather, soprano; and Claude Gotthelf, pianist; Julia Culp, the noted Dutch lieder singer, all names to conjure with, drew audiences running into the hundreds and thousands.

Fifteen prominent organists played at the Spreckels organ, and one, Dr. Sidney Durat, of Cincinnati, at the White Temple. The guest organists at the Exposition included such men as Clarence Dickinson, William Carl, Richard Keys Biggs, Harold Gregson of Australia, and William Gomph of Buffalo.

In point of picturesque setting and impressiveness, the ceremonies at the Exposition Christmas night exceed any other musical event of the year. In no other portion of the United States could such a program have been given out of doors, and in no portion of Southern California could it have been give more successfully than in San Diego. A balmy night, with stars shining softly overhead, served to increase the Christmas spirit that pervaded the 5,000 people who attended.

Three vested quartets stationed at different points on the Plaza de Panama sang Christmas carols, the echo of one quartet scarcely dying away before another quartet took up the succeeding verse. Before each singer blazed a tiny candle, and the effect was that of three choirs singing in a giant cathedral.

This effect was heightened when at the Spreckels organ I the Plaza de los Estados, the listeners gazed upon of a hut of thatched palms within which were figures of the Madonna, the Christ Child, the Three Wise Man, and Joseph. There in the semi-darkness, lighted only by the blaze of the giant Christmas tree nearby, the choristers in vestments of red and white, sang of Christ’s birth to the silent throng, and the great organ pealed forth its noble tones, while in the western sky hung a long star of exceeding brightness.

A feature of this entertainment was that is was managed entirely by women, and it is difficult to conceive that men could have exceeded their handiwork. Great credit for Exposition music is due Miss Gertrude Gilbert, chairman of the music committee of the Woman’s Board, and to Mrs. L. L. Rowan and Mrs. Florence Schinkel-Gray, who assisted her throughout the year.

When the music lover turns from the Exposition, he discovers that in other parts of the city, the musical results of the year are of importance. Sixteen artists from other cities gave recitals in San Diego theaters, hotels and churches. There were eight concerts by orchestras, give performances of oratorio by choral societies, two recitals by visiting string quartets and one by a local string quartet, and two concerts by a children’s orchestra. Six outside artists appeared as soloists at these orchestral and oratorio performances. In addition, there were half a hundred musicales and recitals given by local artists, the records of which are not available to the writer.

Four concerts were given during the year by the Popular Symphony Orchestra under the leadership of Chesley Mills. This organization is having its troubles with finances at present, but it is sincerely to be hoped that the lack of dollars will be remedied in time to save the orchestra from dissolution.

The People’s Chorus, under the leadership of Willibald Lehmann, has given four concerts at the Exposition and one at the Spreckels Theater during 1915, and has scheduled for early in 1916 a performance of the oratorio "Samson." The Spreckels Theater performance was that of Haydn’s "Creation." Its success led to a repetition of it on Easter Sunday at the Spreckels organ, the result being of even greater artistic merit. To this organization, in conjunction with the Popular Symphony Orchestra, was given the honor of assisting in the dedication of the organ on last New Year’s Eve.

Four concerts were given by the San Diego Symphony Orchestra and four by the San Diego Choral Society, both of which are under the leadership of B. Roscoe Schyrock. Two performances of Mendelssohn’s "Elijah" were given and one performance of Handel’s "Messiah." Another performance of this latter oratorio will be given tonight.

Perhaps the most influential and prosperous musical organization in the city, and the one which has brought more high-class artists to San Diego than any other institution this year than any other institution, except the Exposition, is the Amphion Club. Under the leadership of Miss Gertrude Gilbert, president, ably assisted by Mrs. Florence Schinkel Gray and Mrs. Edward T. Lannon, vice president and secretary respectively, the club has brought to San Diego during 1915 Fritz Kreisler, the king of violinists; Julia Culp, the Dutch contralto, who has the reputation of being the greatest lieder singer of the present day; Tina Lerner, the brilliant Russian pianist; Efram Zimbalist, the Russian violinist who is giving Kreisler a hard fight for supremacy among the fiddlers of the world; the Soellner String Quarter, an organization whose rise in the musical world has been phenomenally rapid; and Myrtle Elvyn, an American pianist of unusual technical attainments and great promise.

In addition to its concerts by outside artist, the Amphion Club has held a number of concerts at the Wednesday clubhouse, at which the leading local musicians have given the programs. The result has been a series of concerts of high standing and an increasing appreciation by San Diegans of the worth of musicians who live in their midst.

An organization which has worked quietly but nevertheless effectively for the best interests of San Diego music is the Mendelssohn-MacDowell Club. Its members meet once a month or oftener in various homes and its programs are given exclusively by local musicians. These programs have been of unusual excellence and the meeting have afforded the club members an opportunity for much musical education as well as for social recreation.

Another musical organization which should be mentioned is the Children’s Orchestra, under the leadership of Chesley Mills. This orchestra has had only two public appearances, but on each occasion its work was of a standard superior to many adult orchestras.

The Tuesday noon free musicales of the Y. W. C. A. also have contributed no little share to the education of the San Diego public in musical appreciation, especially among those who have been so unfortunate as not to be able to hear many of the great artists who have given concerts in this city. The leading artists have freely donated their services to this worthy cause.

Of the many performers and teachers in San Diego, who are working quietly and bravely to inculcate high ideals on the youth of San Diego and to raise their standards of musical performance, space forbids mention. They are an earnest and conscientious band to whom the high principles and the beauty of their calling man more than its monetary returns.

What the financial benefit of music has been to San Diego in 1915 is incalculable. Music, it is contended, has drawn more people to the Panama-California Exposition than any other single attraction, and the result of the concerts given there, as well as in other parts of the city is evidencing itself daily in the demands for musical instruments and for performances of a high standard by professionals. L. S. Behymer, the Los Angeles music manager, who has had more than a quarter of a century of experience in his line, recently estimated that San Diego has invested in music more than a million and a quarter dollars. Even he admits, however, that he cannot estimate in dollars and cents the return which this investment is bringing in advertising, education, and the raising of artistic and esthetic ideals in the present and the coming generation.

THE SPRECKELS ORGAN

When on the night of December 31, 1914, John D. Spreckels presented to the people of the city of San Diego the magnificent organ and pavilion that stand in the Plaza de los Estados of the Panama-California Exposition, few persons in the throng that stretched away from the donor as far as he could see realized what hours of delight that gift would bring to San Diegans and the strangers within her gates. Few could foresee that the pick of organists and singers of America would be eager to be heard at the organ, that its fame would be heralded throughout the western hemisphere, that the eye of the camera would project its likeness upon the pages of every great newspaper and magazine of America, and that the musicians of two continents would look back with pride upon their recitals with it as events in their careers.

These are not idle boasts. There are facts and figures to prove them, and logic to back them. With the exception of the Exposition itself, the Spreckels Organ, as it is called, has done more than anything else in San Diego to make this city known and discussed throughout the United States. And as far as the musicians and music lovers (who are legion) are concerned the organ in a way takes precedence over the Exposition.

The Spreckels Organ is the only outdoor organ in the world. There is nothing similar to it in Europe, and the nearest approach to it in America is the big organ in Chautauqua, New York. But the Chautaqua organ stands beneath an immense open-air pavilion and is only slightly more entitled to be classed as an open-air organ than is the big organ in the Tabernacle at Salt Lake City.

Being the first of its kind, the Spreckels organ was, in a sense, an experiment. To secure a given volume of sound from an outdoor instrument is a much more difficult problem that is presented by an indoor instrument. In the latter, the builder may count upon the acoustic properties of the building to help attain the needed volume and intensity of sound is dependent entirely upon the strength of the vibrations which are produced in the instrument itself. For instance, at the San Francisco Exposition players upon the big organ in Festival Hall discovered that they might not use the full power of the instrument because the flood of sound was overpowering. The Spreckels organ, on the contrary, can be played at its full power and, with favorable winds, its tones have been heard a full mile or more distant.

Another experiment was in the problem of preserving an equable temperature. Even in San Diego, with its ten-degree thermometer, changes of temperature must be guarded against in this instrument for a change in temperature of five or six degrees will, by expansion or contraction, alter the pitch of the metal pipes. This problem was partially solved by double walls in the organ pavilion, but this was not enough, and it has been necessary for Organ Tuner R____ to go over some of the pipes every day to insure their accurate pitch.

In the construction of this instrument are to be found all of the up-to-date features and conveniences which the great organ builders of the world have invented. Its action is electrical and, therefore, instantaneous. It has every variety of stop and every resource for tonal coloring known to the art of organ building. There are four manuals, or keyboards, not counting the pedals, eighty-six stops and eight pushbuttons to each manual by means of which the organist can make any changes of stops he desires in a fraction of a second. Each of the four manuals is in reality a keyboard for a separate organ, with its own stops and pipes. Counting from the top down, there are the solo organ, the swell organ, the great organ, and the orchestral organ. Each can be used alone, and any or all may be linked together, with no more exertion on the part of the player than is required to play one. The same strength of touch is required, whether the organist plays the softest pianissimo or the most tremendous fortissimo. The electrical power does the extra work for the organist. A twenty-horsepower motor furnished the power that operates the stops, the pipes and the windchests. The depression of a key forms an electrical contact which instantaneously opens the valve of its individual pipe and instantly closes the valve when the pressure upon the key is withdrawn. Originally, it was necessary to have wire cords and strings to manipulate these pipe valves. All the organs in Germany are built with this cumbersome obsolete action. The burdens which it places upon the performer can be realized by anyone who has played a melodeon using the octave double stop.

Apart from the value of the Spreckels organ to San Diego as a means of spreading its fame abroad, and infinitely more important to those who see in the culture of a city its greatest advancement has been the educational value of this noble instrument to the citizens of the city, this in spite of the fact that owing to the mixed character of the crowds that have attended the recitals during the last year and will attend them this year, Dr. Humphrey J. Stewart, the official organist, has made no special effort to educate his hearers to an appreciation of organ classics. Later, when Dr. Stewart may calculate upon the greater number of his audience attending all his recitals, he intends to take up the educational side of his work through chronological programs, annotated programs, and other approved methods.

During its brief existence of one year, the Spreckels organ has sent forth melody more times probably than any other organ in America in a like period. Only seven times in the 365 days of the year has Dr. Stewart been forced to abandon his daily recitals because of weather conditions. Daily and Sunday the recitals have been given diligently by him or other organists. Eight numbers were played at each recital making a total of 2,864 selections played during the year at these recitals alone. In addition to this, Dr. Stewart or his substitutes took part in a number of special programs, such as the night when Madame Schumann-Heink sang to 20,000 people, and when Marcella Craft, George Hamlin, Hugh Allen, and Alys Larreyne were heard in concert. Others that may be mentioned are the dedication concert on the night of December 31, 1914, the performance of "The Creation" by the People’s Chorus on Easter Sunday, the Military Mass on Catholic Day, and Christmas night. Also the organ was played at special concerts by persons other than the regular organist, among them the concerts by the Tabernacle Choir of Ogden.

During the year the following guest-organists have played on the organ:

Dr. Frank Wilbur Chase, Sewickly, Pa.; Dr. George Whitefield Andrews, Oberlin, Ohio (two recitals); Clarence Dickinson, New York (two recitals); Warren D. Allen, San Jose (one week); Dr. Roland Diggie, Los Angeles (three recitals); William J. Gomph, Buffalo, N. Y. (two weeks); Richard Keys Biggs, Brooklyn (two recitals); Ernest Douglas, Los Angeles (three recitals); Miss Caroline Lowe, Cleveland, Ohio; Harry L. Vibbard, Syracuse, N. Y. (two recitals); Dr. William C. Carl, New York; Harold Gregson, Auckland, New Zealand (three recitals); Will C. MacFarlane, Portland, Maine; Walter Handel Thorley, San Francisco (seven recitals); Archibald Sessions, Los Angles (two recitals).

Outside artists who have sung at the organ as part of the recital programs, or in whose concerts the organ was used were:

Madame Schumann-Heink, contralto; George Hamlin, tenor; Marcella Craft, soprano; Cecil Fanning, baritone; Mlle. Alys Larreyne, soprano; Hugh Allen, baritone; Ethelynde Smith, soprano; Eleanora Patterson, contralto; George von Surdam, tenor: Mollia Byerly Wilson, contralto; Alexander Gray, baritone; Effie Stewart, soprano; Earle Meeker, baritone; Edwin House, base; Haydn Jones, tenor; Alice Brown, contralto; Dr. Victor Laurent, baritone; Mrs. Mary Linck Evans, soprano; Claudia Albright, contralto; Ellen Beach Yaw, soprano; Florencio Constantino, tenor: George Alamand, baritone; and M___ Buckler Stevenson, soprano.

Local artists who have sung at the organ are:

Miss Blanche Lyons, soprano; Mrs. L. L. Rowan, contralto; Dean Blake, baritone; Frederick Beyer, tenor; Mrs. J. M. O’Toole, soprano; Mrs. J. Perry Lewis, soprano, Otto J_____, baritone.

In addition to concerts on the dedication night and on Easter Sunday, the People’s Chorus also gave two Sunday afternoon concerts during the year, and the San Diego Choral Society one. Other artists and organizations who appeared in concert at the organ, but without the assistance of that instrument will be treated of in another article.

As illustrating the variety of the organ recitals, it may be mentioned that selections by 150 composers have found places on the programs. According to the number of different selections, the most prominent of these composers were: Back, seven; Beethoven, six; Chopin, three; Brahms, three; Dubois, seven; Diggle, five; Foote, five; Grieg, four; Gounod, four; Guilmant, eleven; Handel, eight; Mendelssohn, twenty-three; Mozart, two; Rossini, two; Raff, two; Ruby, three; Stewart, ten; Schumann, three; Salome, six; Schubert, four; Saint-Saens, seven; Spohr, three; Verdi, two; Wagner, nine. In the number of times a composer was represented on the program, Mendelssohn led with ninety-six appearances, while Wagner came second with sixty-nine. The most popular number was Mendelssohn’s "Spring Song," which was played twenty-nine times; next came Schumann’s "Traumerei," which was played seventeen times.

During the year requests have been made for many selections which were not given because of their non-suitability to the organ. The wonderful "Fire Music: and the "Ride of the Valkyries" from Wagner’s "Die Walkure" are in this class, as is also the "Tannhauser March." Many of Tchaikovsky’s compositions have been found unsuitable also. The composers of these selections have depended largely upon rapid violin passages for their principal effects. As yet no organ device has been invented which will serve as an acceptable substitute for fast and sweeping string work.

by the president of the board of directors to represent the women of the city and county of San Diego, and to care for Exposition fields especially feminine. Appointed as 20 members, it was added to by 13 of the directors’ wives, who accepted the invitation to become working members and, ex officio, by the wives of mayors during 1915, Mrs. Charles O’Neall and Mrs. Edwin M. Capps. Its work, looking back over 1915, has centered in three places: the women’s reception room known as the Persimmon Red Room in the California Building; the silence room on the lowest floor of the same building, which has rested many feet and heads from all over the United States; and the children’s day nursery, maintained in a little bungalow beyond the gorgeous canna gardens on the north of the Prado.

The furnishing of the first, the reception room, is the work of Miss Alice Klauber and her committee, and from the ardent daily questioning of visitors and succeeding letters from every state in the Union, has evidently furnished to many men and women ideas for their own drawing rooms, tea rooms, and sales rooms, in large and small corners of the country. It is maintained by a house committee, headed by Mrs. Jarvis Doyle, whose daily care has been the keeping of fresh flowers and fruits, typical of the prodigality of California, and shrubs and plants gathered as well from the sands of the desert --- as the much-noticed Crucifixion thorn --- as from the peaks of nearby mountains. At Thanksgiving time, even vegetables _____ San Diego’s county abundance: strings of picturesque red peppers, great pink pumpkins, which one little girl visitor hailed as "those giant baby tangerines." The room has been hostessed by ladies from every organization in the county, and the Hostess Committee from the Woman’s Board, Mrs. A. E. Frost and Mrs. J. G. Burne, feel that their acquaintance has been enlarged and enriched by hundreds of gracious women who for the past 365 days have greeted and chatted with thousands of guest of the Exposition who daily pass through the women’s rooms.

It is here that the cordial hospitality of California has been manifested to many distinguished guests of every world-interest: the arts, politics, organized labor, men and women high in every conceivable and diverse walk of international life. These teas, simple in their appointments, were under the direct responsibility of Mrs. George McKenzie and her committee, and, while tea was served to the nucleus of distinguished guests, it invariably included every guest in the room, and that number in an afternoon has reached a thousand. Such welcome, in its spirit and action, goes far to perpetuate in the minds of Eastern visitors the well-known phrase "famous California hospitality."

The music for varied afternoons in the Persimmon Red Room has been in charge of Miss Gertrude Gilbert and many local San Diego musicians.

Downstairs, on the same floor as the Pioneers’ Room and the lovely chapel of St. Francis, is the Silence Room, its conception and equipment the work of the brains and hands of the Woman’s Board, and itself the special protégé of the president, Mrs. Ivor N. Lawson. Furnished in soft pinks and grays by Miss Klauber, presided over from 9 to 5:30 by a graduate nurse, not a day has gone by when its cots, beds and wicker rockers have not rested women, weary with much sightseeing. Sometimes only a footbath or cup of hot tea, sometimes expert medical care were required, and of the four thousand or more cared for, it has been to the amazement of all guests that no fee was ever accepted. Perhaps, among women guests, no impression of the Exposition’s courtesy and completeness was a better silent advertisement than this.

A later need, unprovided for by the Exposition, appeared and was met by the Woman’s Board in the children’s day nursery. Financed by the committee, under Mrs. Uriel Sebree, the equipment of the little brown cottage was entirely provided by donations, from cribs to toys and perambulators, secured by Mrs. Julius Wangenheim, Mrs. Arthur Marston, Mrs. E. Thelen, and Mrs. Frank Von Tesmar. Untiring in their efforts to provide for the baby visitors, the nurse in charge reports from her checking cards 800 babies in the months since April, when the nursery was started. What expense of time, thought and money it has meant to the devoted and resourceful children’s committee, has been recompensed by the relief of many a weary visiting mother and the content of the visiting baby.

The Woman’s Board, as appointed, designated the following officers and heads of standing committees which have served without charge throughout the year:

Mrs. Ivor N. Lawson, president; Mrs. Uriel Sebree, first vice president; Mrs. A. E. Frost, second vice president; Mrs. T. B. Wright, corresponding secretary; Mrs. Earl Garrettson, recording secretary; Miss Alice Halliday, treasurer; Mrs. George McKenzie, entertainment; Miss Alice Klauber, furnishing; Miss Gertrude Gilbert, music; Mrs. Jarvis L. Doyle, house; Miss Daisy Barteau, organized labor; Mrs. B. D. Saville, Federated States; Mrs. A. E. Horton; Mrs. J. G. Burne; Mrs. Clark W. McKee, San Diego County representative of Woman’s Auxiliary of Southern California Panama Expositions Commission; Mrs. A. S. Bridges; Mrs. E. Thelan; Mrs. Frank Von Tesmar; Mrs. Ernest E. White; Miss Gertrude Longenecker, education.

The San Diego Museum was established on the Exposition grounds for the purpose of cooperating with the city, through its park commission and with correlated societies, in making the benefits of the Exposition perpetual. The park buildings and scientific collections are the permanent possession of the people. By developing a great cultural and recreational center the Exposition was made a permanently productive investment.

The scientific collections that were acquired with the assistance of the Archaeological Institute of America and the Smithsonian Institution are in the museum. Of great initial value, they have now become priceless. Private collections made at great expense can, after serving the purpose of the owners, be kept intact forever and multiplied in value by depositing them in the public museum. Valuable collections are in the museum as gifts and loans.

The museum is not a mere depository for collections, but an active educational institution. Lecture courses, art exhibitions, concerts, pageants and moving pictures are regular museum activities. Scientific laboratories in affiliation with national institutions are maintained. These laboratories are of great service to the schools, courts and social agencies.

The rush of functions and courtesies extended on behalf of the Panama-California Exposition to prominent visitors by President G. A. Davidson personally during the year would have racked the nerves of any man less evenly tempered and placed his in a rest cure sanitarium indefinitely.

Imperturbable in temperament, polished in manner, quietly if not slowly spoken, those who observed him on various occasions during a day and evening wondered where he showed the speed that enable him to appear so calmly sedate, in the proper garb of the hour and occasion, without seeming to have disappeared at any interval from the round of events.

One could see President Davidson at 10 o’clock receiving some governor and party in high fiat and formal morning dress in his reception room in the California Building and see him a few hours later taking the governor to luncheon on the grounds, but wandering over to the delightful Pepper Grove, one would see him there, as if by magic, making the guests at some society picnic at home, in flannels and soft white hat. Hurry, if one would to the open-air organ pavilion, and he would be seen there delivering an address of welcome to some visiting organization in the proper formal dress. Hungry, one could wander to a certain swell café on the grounds, and there he would see the president again presiding at some stag affair in dinner jacket, and then, attending some elaborate ball, see him bowing in evening dress.

How was it done? Nobody knew. Perhaps, however, there was a presto-change dressing room with a handy valet somewhere near his office. Anyway, being an Exposition president keeps one busier than work, and there was no pay for President Davidson either.

Extending across the entire north end of the Plaza de Panama stands the Sacramento Valley and Mountain Counties building, pronounced by architects and artists to be one of the most beautiful buildings on the grounds, occupying, as its beauty justly deserves, the most prominent location within the gates of the Exposition.

Within this building is housed an exhibition of the wonderfully diversified products of the Sacramento Valley and its tributary mountain counties. The interior of the building is an unique and artistic as the exterior. An installation of the products of this great valley presents a pleasing contrast to other beautiful installations to be found in the various buildings.

The feature that arrests the eye of the visitor is the impression of space, room, the wide, unobstructed aisles being devoid of the too often congested grocery store features of exposition installation. This liberal use of space was designed to impress the visitor with one of the Sacramento Valley’s principal resources, the vast acreage of splendid, unoccupied agricultural land.

The next impression that the visitor will not fail to note is the unique beauty of the native pine wood, from which the various installation features have been constructed. This feature was also designed to exhibit the ____ lumber industry of the mountain section, east of the Sacramento Valley, an industry which totals about $25,000,000 annually. The only treatment of the wood has been to slightly fume in with a painter’s torch, which accentuates but does not change the grain, after which it was treated with a light coat of varnish.

Mineral Resources Shown

Along the broad aisles have been arranged the wonderfully diversified agricultural, mineral and forest resources of this empire in the northern section of California. Beautiful transparencies show the Sacramento River, which flows from the base of Mount Shasta in Siskiyou County to the Bay of San Francisco. On the east bank of this river, ninety miles from San Francisco, stands Sacramento, the capital city of California.

In the Sacramento Valley Building will be found the most complete mineral exhibit at the Exposition. Prominent, of course, is gold, the output of which from this section of California has maintained the state in the position of the leading gold-producing state in the Union since 1848 when Marshall took out the first nugget on the south bank of the American River in El Dorado County, forty-two miles east of the city of Sacramento. Included in this mineral exhibit is every mineral found in California, with the single exception of mineral oil. The grand prize was awarded this mineral exhibit by the Panama-California Exposition jury of awards.

The lumber exhibit, while not large, is interesting, showing the soft wood timber industry, comprising sugar pine, white pine, yellow pine, spruce, fir and cedar. One clear sugar pine plank measures 54 inches in width.

There is installed in this building an exhibit of every agricultural product grown in California, with the single exception of cotton. There is no agricultural product grown in California that does not grow commercially and profitably in the Sacramento Valley and its tributary mountain counties. All agricultural conditions, soil, water and climate are typically Californian. These conditions are as near ideal as can be found in any part of the state.

Representative Board

The Sacramento Valley Building and its exhibit was created and has been maintained by the Board of Exposition Commissioners composed of the following representatives from each of the ten counties exhibiting at San Diego.

(The names follow.)

The building and exhibit has been under the management of C. H. Dunbar of Sacramento, with a staff of assistants consisting of A. B. Barker, Solano; C. E. Robinson, Glenn County; E. G. Atwood, El Dorado County; Clarence Smith, Sacramento County; Evelyn L. Gwinn, Sacramento, and Miss Gertrude Hutchins, Colusa County.

One of the most interesting exhibits in the Sacramento Valley building and one that means much to the future, not only of the valley, but of the state of California, is the splendid rice exhibit installed in this building. Rice is one of the leading cereals of the world. There are probably more people who live on rice than any other cereal grown. We consume annually in the United States about 100,000,000 bushels and of that amount 80,000 bushels in imported annually into the United States. About 23,000,000 bushels are raised in the southern states.

In 1909 the secretary of agriculture became convinced that rice should be grown in California. He knew we had the soil and climate. The only unknown quantity was water, and as the most abundantly watered section of California is the Sacramento valley, he established an experimental rice-growing station at Biggs in Butte county. The experts experimented on _00 varieties of rice, finally settling on some half dozen varieties as being adapted to our soil and climate.

In 1911 the first field of 150 acres was planted. It yielded a crop of about 80 bushels to the acre. In 1914 we harvested 15,000 acres of rice, yielding about 1,000,000 bushels. This year we have just harvested 30,000 acres of rice, yielding over 2,000,000 bushels. There are about 300,000 acres of rice land in the Sacramento valley, and an abundance of water available for every acre. The average yield of this crop is about 80 bushels to the acre in California, so that when the entire 300,000 acres shall be in rice, as it will be within the next ten years, the output in the Sacramento valley of this basic cereal will be in the neighborhood of 25,000,000 bushels --- more than is produced in the entire rice area of the southern states. The quality is not excelled in any section of the world where rice is produced.

3:8. Montana exhibit boosts state resources; sixteen awards captured at Panama-California Exposition; fine mineral display; paintings of natural scenery and crops decorate building, by L. A. Pyle

The Montana State Building and exhibit at the Panama-California Exposition was made possible by the generosity of ex-Senator W. A. Clark , of Butte, Montana, who donated the building. The exhibit was furnished by the state.

The Montana Building has one of the best locations on the Exposition grounds, being built on the highest knoll, from which there is a beautiful view of the "Harbor of the Sun" and Balboa Park. The building is one of the largest state buildings and was built along lines different from the rest of the Exposition buildings.

The interior of the building shows the most artistic work of grains ever seen at any world’s fair. There are beautiful panels of oats, barley, clover, alfalfa and a wonderful frieze of oats, braided straw, wheat, wild grasses and flax.

A large reception room contains a beautiful old-fashioned open fireplace with a rustic mantel made of boulders. The pretty baby grand Starr piano is made of weathered oak to match the rest of the room. Papers are received from all cities and towns in Montana and kept on file for persons visiting the building. The walls are hung with paintings of the Glacier National Park and pictures of some of the finest mountain scenery in the world, furnished by the Great Northern Railway Company. There is also a smoking room for gentleman and a rest room for ladies.

Besides other exhibits there is a fine mineral display. Montana has always been one of the leading mining states in the Union, producing large quantities of copper, zinc, gold, silver, and coal; and recently the third largest gas well in the world was struck in the northern part of the state.

A display of large sugar beets showing Montana’s sugar beet, raised from seed grown in Montana. Up until the European war America has been getting its sugar beet seed from Germany. The exhibit includes a display of potatoes that made Montana and the Northern Pacific Railway famous: "the route of the big baked potato." Some of them weigh as much as eight pounds, solid and with as fine flavor as the small ones.

Montana spent the least of any state on its exhibit, and received almost three times as many awards as any of the other states --- sixteen awards in all. Montana was awarded grand prize for agriculture exhibit and gold medals for wheat, oaks, barley, peas, flax, grasses, rye, alfalfa, clover, four, brick, graphite, and park exhibit building.

The management of the building in boosting the state has had the advantage of Montana’s wonderful 1915 crop. This means winter wheat going as high as 78 bushels to the acre, and a total crop of 40,000,000 bushels; also a heavy yield of oats of an extra fine quality and a bumper crop of the famous Mackintosh wormless red apples. The state as a whole is in the most prosperous condition it has ever been in its history. Copper and zinc mines and smelters are running overtime. Butte, a city of 70,000 population, has a monthly payroll of $2,000,000. Railroad construction work is starting up and settlers are flocking in from all parts of the United States.

The state with its wonderful natural resources, still undeveloped, needs people and capital, and expects great results from its exhibit at the Panama-California Exposition.

Known as the home of hospitality, the beautiful building erected and maintained at the San Diego Exposition by the Salt Lake and Union Pacific System was the center of continuous social activity during 1915.

As testifying to the popularity of the building, the Exposition jury of awards awarded the building a gold medal and designated it as a unique structure at the Exposition.

The building itself is as novel as its location and contains a magnificent exhibit room illuminated with photographs and photographic transparencies illustrating the scenic and development features along the Salt Lake Route, the Union Pacific, and the Oregon Short Line. At one end of this exhibit hall is a gigantic bird’s eye map in oils, showing the Salt Lake Route and its tributary country, while the other end of the room is occupied by a comparison map of Yellowstone Park as reached by the Union Pacific System.

4:1-2. EDITORIAL: The Union’s 1916 Annual . . . Another Year of the Exposition . . . A Most Encouraging Outlook.

Attended by practically 2,000,000 visitors from all quarters of the world, the Panama-California Exposition at San Diego has just rounded out twelve months of operation which will be set down in exposition annals as a distinctive achievement in the world of big endeavor. Like a thoroughbred which has made every post a winning one, the Exposition has made each month of its operation since its opening, January 1, 1915, return snug financial gain. Thus, such forecasts that have been made in the past that expositions at best can be operated only a sort time successfully, have been contradicted. The prophets did not figure with golden climate, wealth of resources or immeasurable pluck and determination.

Three hundred and sixty five days have elapsed since San Diego gave birth to its dream of years, and now, secure in success, this city of big ideas points with pride to its accomplishment, for the Exposition stands as a monument to its daring, business acumen, and liberality. It is not a task of small proportions for a city of San Diego’s size to build and operate an exposition which should win unstinted praise from world travelers.

Exposition Attendance Is Cosmopolitan

With Europe’s doors closed to tourists on account of the war, the Exposition drew a heavy attendance in its opening month last January, satisfied its patrons, and they went back to their homes imbued with the idea that the sons of the West had built on a high mesa overlooking San Diego an Exposition Beautiful, far different from and in history and so different in detail from the one at San Francisco that the two could not be considered rivals. Through an average attendance which, will not up to expectations, was sufficient to yield a profit, the Exposition was operated January, February and March. The tourist rates took effect in March and soon an appreciable increase in visitors was noticed. Then came May, the last of the spring months, and attendance totaled 179, 818. June gave approximately the same figure, while the vacation months of July and August contributed heavy patronage, July going down as a banner month of 301,937. Throughout the late summer and fall the decline in attendance has been the natural result of the slight decrease in Western travel, but, with the advent of cold weather in the East, travel to the Exposition again increased. According to estimates of Exposition officials, attendance in November was approximately 125,000, while the December’s was over the 100,000 mark.

The Exposition has been cosmopolitan in its attendance as well as in its attractions. During the year it has been visited by twenty governors of states in the United States; Vice President Marshall; Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, former president; William Jennings Bryan, former secretary of state; Franklin K. Lane, secretary of the interior; Josephus Daniels, secretary of the navy; Lindley M. Garrison, secretary of war; William M. McAdoo, secretary of the treasury; and scores of United States senators and representatives. Had it not been for important international problems brought on by the European war and the Mexican situation, President Wilson would have headed the list of distinguished visitors. His regret at inability to attend is expressed in a message in which he gives liberal praise of the perseverance and pluck necessary to building and operating successfully for a year such a laudable Exposition. The United States has not alone, however, contributed all of the distinguished visitors throughout the year, for dignitaries have come from many countries, all to be entertained by President G. A. Davidson, whose devoted to the Exposition has been a large factor in its success. At sacrifice of private business, Mr. Davidson has been a twenty-four hour man on the job throughout the year and his energies were directed toward making the Exposition successful, not for any financial remuneration he would receive, but purely for the love of directing an enterprise which head had been associated with since its inception.

As has been indicated, attractions at the Exposition, aside from those furnished by the beauty of the grounds, artistic arrangements and comprehensive exhibits, have been as cosmopolitan as its personnel and patronage. The Exposition has been the common meeting ground of all classes and creeds, likewise the clearing house of ideas for the entertainment of those who will be amused by departures from stereotyped programs. Entertainment has been of a hodgepodge variety, diversity being the keynote. Whether special attractions took the form of an open-air ball at night in the Plaza de Panama, competitive drills by crack military and fraternal organizations, spellbinding oratory from nationally known men, a Shakespeare festival on greensward, or an aerial insanity furnished by some heedless aviator, it was always something new. Thus the Exposition with its diversity was able to attract and amuse everyday those residing in its nearest territory.

Convention bodies in great number visited the Exposition. Practically every line of industry and many of the arts and sciences were represented by these gatherings. Long before the Exposition opening, national organizations seemed to realize the benefits to be derived from choosing the Exposition as a convention ground. Several special trains pouring in convention delegates in large numbers arrived each week and conventions ran the gauntlet of variety from that of the National Association of Ice Cream Manufacturers to the California Teachers’ Institute, Southern Section, which had an attendance of 6,000 school teachers from the southland.

Each holiday was made the occasion of special celebration. To show that the Exposition in its celebration was without comparison by attention in narrow lines drawn by creeds or nations, the observance of the Chinese New Year in February is cited. Then again the celebration of Japan is mentioned. Canada also was given a special day, while each state had a state day. Standing out as distinctive for the influence created for better citizenship was the three-day exhibition of the Liberty Bell. In no place in the country where the Liberty Bell was exhibited on this year’s tour was more honor paid to it than at the Exposition. Well did it seem to fit in with the Exposition atmosphere, an atmosphere which reflects in architecture of buildings the early struggles in Southern California shores for the establishment of Christianity and a better liberty.

Children’s Fair Successful

Exposition success must not be measured along by work contributed by grownups. Young America had its part to play and well has it fitted in throughout the year, in pageants, parades, festivals and juvenile exercises. San Diego children have worked successfully and a share in the triumph of the Exposition must not be denied them, for at times one was reminded of the Biblical declaration, "a little child shall lead them." One of the most notable examples of child endeavor was shown in the presentation of the Children’s Fair, and here again the Exposition achieved another record, being the first exposition to conduct a children’s fair. This fair had more than 3,000 exhibits of youthful handicraft in arts, science, agriculture, and mechanics. Leading educators pronounced the display startling and one that well reflected the great advance in recent years in child education.

The Exposition was indeed fortunate in having military stationed on the grounds, for without this important adjunct, there would have been an absence of the proper pomp and ceremony incident to the visits of dignitaries. The military also was a part of daily Exposition life, supplied snap and precision to increase attractiveness of daily programs. On a commanding mesa, just in the rear of the state buildings, the Second Battalion, Fourth Regiment, U.S. Marine Corps, commanded by Major W. N. McKelvey, established a model camp with the Exposition’s opening. At this camp was seen the daily life of Uncle Sam’s men and their drills and reviews have done much to give the public a better understanding of military service. In these days when greater national preparedness is being urged, it is but the natural result that Exposition visitors should give the military at the Exposition scrutinizing attention. Through the efforts of Colonel J. H. Pendleton, commanding officer of the regiment, the Marines have been available for many programs throughout the year, while the regimental band has played daily concerts.

Military Plays Part

With its camp pitched just outside the Exposition grounds, a squadron of the First Cavalry, commanded earlier in the year by Captain George Van Horn Moseley, and more recently by Major William T. Littlebrant, has taken part in all the military activities. At various times the companies of coast artillery from Fort Rosecrans have participated in the big military turnouts, escorts and parades. The Thirteenth Band, Coast Artillery Corps, which has been a musical attraction during the entire year, took quarters near the grounds in the summer that it might be more readily available at short notice.

But Uncle Sam’s land force did not hold all the attention, for frequently the commissioned and enlisted personnel of Pacific fleet warships responded with drills and parades. This was accomplished through the courtesy of Admiral T. H. Howard, who until recently commanded the Pacific fleet, and his successor, Admiral Cameron MacRae Winslow, has established his willingness for a continuance of the navy’s participation in Exposition events. Of national importance, one event stands out in luminous light in connection with the navy’s activities. This was the visit to the Exposition of 500 Annapolis midshipmen, all of whom made the cruise from the Atlantic seaboard through the Panama Canal to San Diego, the first port of call. Military organizations not in the regular establishment also made official visits to the Exposition, and notable among these were the Richmond, Virginia Light Infantry Blues, the First Regiment Infantry, National Guard, Illinois, and the Salt Lake City High School Cadets.

Music Prominent Feature

In an exposition which is developed with art, it was surely appropriate that music should be given much consideration. Throughout the year, the daily programs at the Spreckels organ by Doctor H. J. Stewart, official organist, have been a pleasing feature. This organ, the greatest outdoor organ in the world, was presented to the City of San Diego by A. B. and John D. Spreckels. In a commanding position, it stands as a monument to their generosity, for the structure and instrument cost $100,000. This organ has been the scene of many successful entertainments, at times calling the world’s greatest soloists and musicians. The concert given by Mme. Ernestine Schumann-Heink to the citizens of San Diego proved a distinct success in the Western musical world. Mme. Schumann-Heink sang to 25,000 people.

On the long list of artists who have appeared at the organ are the names of some of the world’s best known singers, musicians, composers, and dramatic stars. A few who have been heard during the Exposition are Signor Florencio Constantino, Ellen Beach Yaw, Carrie Jacobs Bond, Claudia Albright, Hamlin Hunt, Warren P. Allen, Will O. MacFarlane, and Mme. Alla Nazimova. Several times San Diego talent has been heard in musical programs.

Throughout the Exposition year San Diego awaited with keen anticipation its greatest day. This, San Diego Day, was observed November 17 when an attendance of about 40,000 testified to the popularity of the Exposition with San Diegans. In preparing for an exposition, San Diego has much experience with celebrations and public exercises, so it was well equipped to turn a mammoth crowd into the Exposition gates on San Diego Day. Loyalty of commercial San Diego was shown on this day, when all places of business were closed at noon. This city-wide closing also established another record and for the first time since San Diego was a city, excepting on the days required by the state laws, the saloons also joined in the closing movement. Of the many celebrations held at the Exposition throughout the year, none was attended with such success as San Diego Day. It came at a period when the Exposition could make its success known by its deeds rather than by words. It was a celebration of achievement.

Western Resources

Built for the purpose of exploiting the resources of California and the states closest to it, the Exposition stuck steadily to its purpose throughout the year. It was the point from which information to colonists and homeseekers was distributed. Such information was circulated at the various state and county buildings and by mid-summer an increase in settlement on Southwestern lands was noticeable as a direct result of the Exposition.

In commercial and industrial displays a difference between this and other expositions was noticed. The Exposition marked the departure from the old line of exhibiting where one can of baking powder or one make of washing machine or a certain order of agricultural implement contested with dozens of others for honors. In choosing exhibits for the Exposition displays were solicited only from the leading manufacturers in each line and thus mediocre exhibits were eliminated. The appreciation of this arrangement is shown in the profitable advertising which exhibitors have gained. With only one exhibit from each branch of manufacturing and that one truly representative, visitors were not compelled to divide their attention among rival exhibits in the same line. Thus there was created an inquiry about exhibits which made future business.

Along in mid-year exhibitors put on these best clothes, so to speak, for the jury of awards convened and competing with products and manufactures from all parts of the Southwest, Southern California again asserted its supremacy as the land for the homeseeker. It was awarded the greatest number of prizes and medals for agricultural display, while the northern part of the state was ably represented by Alameda County, which was given fifty-six awards for its display of manufactured articles. This was a greater number than that secured for manufactured exhibits by an county represented at the Exposition.

Police Arrangements Perfect

With liberal attendance on everyday and big crowds pouring through the grounds on special occasions, it had been expected that the usual influx of the criminal element would be noticed. Long before the opening, however, the policing and protection of visitors had been well organized. This important point was placed under the direct charge of Colonel William A. Pinkerton of the Pinkerton Detective Agency. Bunco men, pickpockets and others of the class who follow criminal pursuits were warned that the San Diego Exposition would be a decidedly unhealthy place for them. The warning was sufficient and throughout the year visitors were afforded entire protection and the Balboa Guard, with its plain clothes detail, made a record for efficient policing. Not a single robbery or work of pickpockets was reported while the guards found numerous articles which had been lost and restored them to their owners. In many cases the property was found and delivered to the owner after the Exposition visit had been concluded.

Fire protection was also entirely adequate throughout the year and, while the fire companies from the City of San Diego stationed within the grounds, responded to several alarms, the fire loss was trivial. It did not exceed $500.

Fair’s Efficient Staff

Businesslike arrangements marked the handling of all Exposition business and with the assistance of an efficiency expert expenses were kept at a minimum. In its employment the Exposition had a number of specialists and yet these id not specialize to the degree where they could not do any other work when the occasion was presented. It is noticeable that there existed between the various departments a cooperation which worked for the Exposition’s success, while back of the project to rule on important questions and preside as a sort of watch dog of the treasury was an executive committee composed of San Diego’s leading businessmen. It was the members of the committee who discarded through loss much of their private business that they might best serve the Exposition cause. Through the Exposition building and during its early operation H. O. Davis, as director general, was its chief executive. His resignation was tendered and accepted August 1, and E. L. Chapin, who had been identified with the Exposition in important positions for three years or more, succeeded him. Thus, Director Chapin became the direct representative of the directors and the executive committee and all of the various departments which were under his charge. Directors who have held office during the year are: R. C. Allen, Lucius R. Barrow, Frank J. Belcher, Jr., L. A. Blochman, George Burnham, William Clayton, G. A. Davidson, C. W. Fox, D. F. Garretson, Percy Goodwin, C. H. Heilbron, M. F. Heller, H. H. Jones, W. F. Ludington, Arthur H. Marston, J. W. Sefton, Jr., W. A. Sloane, John D. Spreckels, C. L. Williams, Julius Wangenheim, D. C. Collier, F. W. Jackson and E. J. Burns. The executive committee was composed of the following: Frank J. Belcher, Jr., G. A. Davidson, P. H. Goodwin, M. F. Heller, H. H. Jones, C. L. Williams, W. A. Sloane, and E. J. Burns.

History of Fair

A superficial review of pre-Exposition history discloses obstacles confronting San Diego which it surmounted in carrying to completion its dream born in civic enterprise and nursed by liberality of its citizens. The birthday of the Exposition can be considered as September 4, 1909. It was on this date that the San Diego Chamber of Commerce got behind the proposal to have the first port of call hold the official celebration of the Panama Canal opening. Rapidly plans were formulated. San Diego subscribed liberally and voted municipal bonds and the project was launched. The official groundbreaking was held in July 1910.

After the Exposition was chartered and underway, San Francisco entered the field and sent a delegation to Washington to seek government recognition and patronage. Thus San Diego and San Francisco became rivals in this one respect. New Orleans saw opportunity of taking advantage on account of the division and made a bid for the 1915 world’s fair.

San Diego withdrew voluntarily that the great event might be held on the Pacific Coast. This resulted in San Francisco having a clear field for her world’s fair, but San Diego decided to hold an exposition of vastly different type from that planned for San Francisco. So it went ahead with its plans and made a bid for foreign participation, sending Colonel D. C. Collier, the first president of the Exposition, into the field for this purpose. Various conditions existing at that time made it obvious that the foreign participation at San Diego would be the participation of industrial leaders rather than governments. Thus San Diego early in the project abandoned the idea for foreign government participation.

Old Spain Architecture

The decision to build the Exposition in the 1400-acre Balboa Park, owned by the City of San Diego, was a popular one and in its building those considered the best landscape and building architects were engaged. These carried to successful completion the beautification of the grounds, construction of buildings, an arrangement which as a whole has been set down as a fine example of engineering skill.

It is the architecture of the buildings which strikes the keynote of harmony, for Mission predominates n California. Back to the days of the good Franciscan fathers the architects went for their types, and well did they portray a class of architecture which has attained great popularity in recent years. It was fitting indeed that they should draw on early California history for Exposition building. Throughout the different types it is seen that the Spanish-Colonial predominates. The Home Economy Building resembles the hacienda [sic] of the Conde d’Heras. In the Indian Arts Building are many suggestions of the Sanctuario de Guadaloupe at Guadalajara.

In the Science and Education Building there are found points resembling the cathedral at Puebla, Mexico, and in the Varied Industries Building there are resemblances to the eighteenth-century monastery at Queretaro, Mexico. The California State Building, of course, bears many resemblances to the beautiful [sic] at Oaxaca, Mexico.

Indian Life Shown

The San Joaquin Valley Building bears an extremely close resemblance to any one of a half dozen of the municipal buildings of Spanish America, although, of course, there are details which originated in the mind of the architect. The building of Kern and Tulare County suggests strongly any number of palaces. The unique building which New Mexico has erected is a copy of the old mission on the rock of Acoma in New Mexico, with a few details introduced from the church of Cochiti.

In the Painted Desert these resemblances are equally marked. The larger pueblos are copies of those at Hopi and Taos and the interior of the lower structure, where the Rio Grande tribes are quartered, is a copy of the ancient Governor’s Palace, El Palacio Real, of Ornate, at Santa Fe. The buildings and small structures throughout the Painted Desert are, of course, an exact imitation of typical scenes in the great Southwest.

Throughout the grounds the planting shows an artistic arrangement such as only could come from the hands of a master. It is such a project as Father Serra must have dreamed of years ago when he laid the foundation of California civilization. Crossing the great Puente Cabrillo, the visitor approaches a massive arch, flanked on one side by a rich cathedral, and, on the other, by a plain mission. The cathedral is the California State Building and the mission is the Fine Arts Building. Once inside this gateway, the visitor looks down the Prado, the main street of the Exposition, on one of the most beautiful views ever seen. Lining the Prado are scores of black acacia trees, behind which stand the wonderful Spanish-Colonial buildings of the Exposition. Over the buildings clamber a riot of vines, the rich green of the leaves giving way here and there to bright flashes of color of the blossoms.

Flowers and Romance

Several of the buildings are large but, except for the great dome and tower of the California State Building, standing at the west approach near the end of the great Puente Cabrillo, few are tall. Instead they spread luxuriously over broad spaces on the mesa which looks down on the sea and the strand of Coronado, or back up the fertile valleys to the Sierras, with long cool cloisters and acacias lining their facades. Instead of making streets, there are prados bordered with acacia and lawns and thick beds of gladiolas and poinsettia, and low shrubbery which droops through the arches of the arcades. Up the walls, up to the Spanish domes and towers and the belfries where pigeons nest and mission bells swing, clambers the gorgeous growth of rose and honeysuckle and bougainvillea, the superb vine whose bloom does much to make a fairyland of Southern California. A portal invites one past the cloister, and beyond there lies a quiet patio, green with foliage illuminated by the color of an occasional flowering shrub, murmuring with the soft play of a fountain.

San Diego has an individual interest in the development of the back country, but broader than that interest was the genuine intent of the Exposition to stimulate bigger things, the upbuilding of the entire West, and in this program Washington and Montana and Kansas took as much interest as Nevada and New Mexico and Utah and the other states which may be considered as in the Southwest. Their state buildings were devoted to a sort of follow-up system of the Exposition’s program for developing the nation’s agricultural resources by methods as novel as the architectural program and as effective.

Back-to-the-Land Movement

The back-to-the-land movement has been urged by pen and brush and oratory. It can be conceded that the country is fairly well aware that there should be a shifting of population from city to country, instead of country to city. It can be conceded that no city man who has made more or less of a failure and his brother who has made more or less of a success in the metropolis alike have a longing to get out of the dust and turmoil and tension of town and into the clear air of the fields. But the land is not occupied, The government has held land shows, but the movement to the farm is not a big one.

The failure of the methods is due to just one thing, the lack of any real information to the possible farmer as to how he was going back to the farm and what he was going to do when he got there. The same is true of world’s fair agricultural exhibits which have shown majestic pyramids of oranges, and a great array of other fruits and vegetables and cereals and grasses. None was materially different from those the possible farmer might have seen in his own city at the grocery or produce exchange. There was another significant difference between San Diego’s new type and the old type world’s fair.

Model Farm Feature

Down the Alameda from that large-scale farm display is the model intensive farm. Many there are in the back-to-the-land movement who can afford to take up 120 or 160 acre tracts, equip them and cultivate them, but many others there are who for financial or physical reasons can do nothing of the sort, but of these men who can see a five-acre tract bearing a variety of fruits and an intensive cultivation bearing still greater variety of vegetables in the soil beneath the fruit trees, if they can see a little section given over to vineyards, another to berries, another to a small poultry farm, if they can see that this tract produces four or five times as much as the same area did under old-style methods and with less labor, if they can catch the spirit of the "little lander," who gets "a sure living and a good profit on a little land," then there is a meaning to them. The effort was to show just such men exactly what they can expect if they are willing to work.

In the center of the model intensive farm is a typical Western bungalow. And while the prospective farmer discovered that modern machinery would save him the drudgery that his grandfather had to bear, the prospective farmer’s wife learned that other machinery will save her the drudgery that was her grandmother’s. She could see that the modern bungalow has equipment just as complete as the city apartment.

Across the ravine from the intensive farm is an orchard in full bearing, designed to show the operation of the latest type of orchard machinery and across the way is another orchard of citrus fruit, picked from the best orchards of Southern California (?), showing the orange, the grapefruit, the lemon, the kumquat and the other citrus fruits growing alongside the paths. The exquisite fragrance of the citrus blossoms lingers long in the nostrils of him who has sniffed it.

Lesson of Exposition

That is the spirit of all the exhibits, many of them out-of-doors, many indoors in the missions, the palaces, the cathedrals of the Spanish city. The broad lawns, the grove of pepper trees, the patios, the wide stretch of open country abloom, stretching down to the canyons, encourage one mightily. He realizes that this space after all is concentration in a small space of the whole life of the new West and he is filled with a longing to see more, to see the great vineyards of olive and orange, to see the vast apple and cherry country to the north, to roam in the forest reserves and up the slopes of the snow-capped Rockies, and over the agricultural empire beyond. It is typically Western, this, but its great lesson, the utilization of possibilities, is as applicable to the cut-out timberlands of Wisconsin, the neglected lands of the South and of New England. He who is willing to learn can learn aplenty, wherever his interests may be.

Exposition year would have been without its light entertainment had it not been furnished by the Isthmus. This, the Exposition’s Joy Street, was in previous expositions known as the Pike or Midway, and it was the gathering place of many carnival crowds. Not only did the Isthmus furnish amusement with its standard attractions, but it proved a continued source of revenue to the Exposition and to the concessionaires. Almost innumerable is the list of special events held on the Isthmus and many times it presented a scene of gay carnival, rivaling the famous New Orleans Mardi Gras.

Onward the Exposition has gone through its twelve month’s operation, gathering impetus with each thirty days and profiting by experience. Its record proclaims to the world that a great future awaits San Diego and that its progressiveness may at any time be looked of to make history.