Louisiana Purchase Exposition, St. Louis 1904

cynical - Thanks! I am planning to be more active now.

wt1 - Great research! I always like to find out what happened to the people and businesses related to old covers. Thanks for the information!

Russ - Very nice looking cover and album page!

Gorgeous covers t360! I am currently seeking a few of those and great to see the actual ones in context. I really only need the 3¢ Monroe and the 10¢ Louisiana Purchase. Also you have pictured a nice tied to cover 328 & 329 both are very nice but I have never seen the Sacajawea Pocahontas(#330) on cover. Beautiful examples indeed! I love covers and wish I had more. The ones you have been showing should be in books on the subject as they are very relevant to the subject(s)!



edit wrong indian...lol


Its early in morning here so I'm rambling again...ha ha!

I_Love_Stamps Thanks! See the Scott 330 on cover in the Jamestown Expo thread.



Here is a Louisiana Expo cover showing an color illustration of the Palace of
Transportation and a photo of it scanned from the 1904 Official Expo Souvenir
booklet (which I recently bought from a dealer for $10).

The "Palace of Electricity" postcard:

wt1 - Great card! Here is another view of the "Palace of Electricity:"

This mourning cover was sent on May 14, 1904 from Stapleton, NY to Brooklyn, NY.



the 2c Jefferson is decently centered;



and the reverse has a nice Brooklyn backstamp.

I just love thepiece on H. Deats. Is anything known about the sender. Did Deats himself attend the fair.

An interesting post card showing the Grand Canyon in 1904, a full 15 years before achieving National Park status. And the visitor was less than impressed. I've seen the canyon many times and I have to assume they were having a bad day, it's a stunning sight.

Grand Canyon Rec'd 1904 cds 2c Louisiana Purchase to England.









1c Louisiana Purchase 1904 St. Louis with silver embossed front showing the Entrance Palace of Liberal Arts, to Esbon, Kansas.










Bill

Bill - Nice Grand Canyon postcard and Palace of Liberal Arts postcard!
I can't imagine not being impressed with the Grand Canyon.



Here is another picture of the Palace of Liberal Arts at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition.



I ordered this cover with a color illustration of the Palace of Liberal Arts from Ruby Stamps before they
closed down their web site.



It has a straight-line Exposition Station cancel dated October 12, 1904. I wished the sender would have put the
stamp on straight! I figure he didn't want to cover-up any of the illustration.

Very nice cards t360.

I see that on the Palace of Liberal Arts card it states cost was $475,000.
Wonder what it would cost now even though I don't think something
this elaborate could still be built.
There just aren't any tradesmen nowadays with skills like those
of 100 years ago.

This was taken off of an "Inflation Calculator" that extended only until 2010:




Although a bit off-topic, I have to respond to this quote:




I was just reading a recent article about post office closings in some parts of the US that involve elaborately built buildings designed by noted architects containing murals by well-known artists who constructed those post offices through the WPA back in the 1930's and now those post offices are being considered for closure and the real estate put up for sale. It seems to me this would be a terrible loss, as those older buildings with such architectural detail would be cost prohibitive to even consider building today.

The cover I posted on the previous page was addressed to Mrs. Charles M. Kurtz. Charles McMeen Kurtz was the art director for the fair and was in charge of all the exhibits in the Palace of Liberal Arts.

You are spot on Litho, I don't think this could be translated into an inflation calculator as it would not take into account the materials that were used back then. Today's tradesmen do not have the skills such as Stone carving, Millwork, Lathe & Plaster etc. Todays building material would erect a building like this using Metal studs and sheetrock.....yuck !

Some absolute stunning pieces on display here, I just love threads like these. Great pieces all, please keep them coming !

I don't know about all expositions and their buildings but the building of the 1893 Colombian Exposition were intentionally not built to last. In fact, there are reports of many of those buildings falling apart towards the end of the fair. Consequently, I suspect that may be true of other expositions and world fairs as well. Most, nearly all, exposition buildings are gone. So, $475,000 or today's $11,376,003.06 to build temporary structures, seems high to me.

Art

This 1903 cover contains an illustrated advertisement for the upcoming
St. Louis World's Fair.



Such a colorful cover must of attracted attention at the St. Louis post office
where it duly received a heavily over-inked hand duplex cancel and two
runs through the machine canceller.

It was sent on September 20th from St. Louis to Franz Bethge on Breite Strasse
in Calvoerde, Herzogtum Braunschweig, Germany.



It arrived in Germany on October 2nd,as indicated by the Calvoerde receiving
mark on the reverse.