Front cover of L’Exposition de Paris, 1900, showing (in the lower half) the Palace of Electric

Front cover of L’Exposition de Paris, 1900, showing (in the lower half) the Palace of Electricity and the Water Castle. A detailed account of the World’s Fair held in Paris in April to November 1900, the book also includes an overview of the previous international expositions held in Europe and the United States, starting with London’s Great Exhibition in London of 1851.

Sound film (shown on a huge screen, 21 by 16 metres in size), moving sidewalks (at three different speeds), x-ray machines, wireless telegraphy, and the diesel engine were among the new technologies being demonstrated at the Exposition. Art and architecture contributions included the Grand Palais and the Petit Palais; Pont Alexandre III, still the city’s most ornate bridge; the Gare d’Orsay, the world’s first electrified urban railway terminus (now an art museum); and a major focus on Art Nouveau. Parisian events that coincided included the opening of the city’s first metro line, between Porte Vincennes and Porte Maillot, and the second Olympic Games of the modern era. And the Eiffel Tower received a coat of bright yellow paint for the first and only time in its history!

Image via Heidelberg University Library’s digital collection.