![]() The cars could hardly be distinguished, they being black with eager humanity who clung to the steps, windows, brakes, in fact wherever they could catch by even an eyelid.” Then there were numberless carriages and wagons and extemporized vehicles of every description, the drivers of which entered into a lively competition as to who should crowd their respective vehicles the most, at the same time losing no opportunity to decry those of their neighbors. It was a two mile trek from the city’s epicenter, so how did folks get to the fair in the 1870s? A local newspaper described the task: “At Illinois and Washington streets there was a jam of street cars and crowds of people filling to overflowing the means of locomotion prepared to take the eager seekers to the Exposition. Looking towards Alabama across 19th Street today. Flag, Alabama Street’s northward ascent ended at the front doors of the Fair’s “Grand Hall.” Centered on the south facade under a mansard tower and U.S. Fronting Exposition Avenue, between 18, was one of the grandest Marion County buildings of the time. Today’s 19th Street debuted on Indianapolis maps as “Exposition Avenue” and merely stretched from Talbott to Peck Street–the alley east of New Jersey Street. Check out a sampling of items that appeared at the fair at the time of this Exposition Building (and later). From organs to stoves, beets to apples, clothing to carpets, all sandwiched between brass bands intermingled with a spectrum of every-aged visitors–the latest advancements and novelties delighted and showcased what was possible in the midst of the industrial revolution. All of this (and more!) fit inside the boundaries of what is today, 22nd to 19th streets, and Central Avenue to the alley west of Delaware.īack then the month-long fair was known as “The Indiana State Fair and Exposition,“ and tens of thousands crowded the buildings to see the pumpkins, patented butter churn, and women’s work to witness popcorn men beckoning fairgoers to sample their heavenly smelling wares– answered by the discordant echo of lemonade men doing the same. Beyond the primary building, smaller structures peppered the landscape, interspersed with a variety of animal sheds, and on the north, a half-mile race course. May, the same local architect of Indiana’s current State House. The imposing Grand Hall Building (pictured above) was composed of one million bricks and designed by Edwin F. However, the Indiana State Fair did take place on the same 36 acres in 1860, 1866, and from 1868-1891. ![]() While no shred of State Fair history remains in Herron-Morton Place today, the Civil War history reminders live on in small markers at the corners of 19th and Talbott, 19th and Central and 21st and Talbott, and a larger, more descriptive one in front of the neighborhood park. The Fair’s new home was requisitioned for Camp Morton in 1861, where many Hoosier lads started their Union Civil War soldier experience and later, where a number of Confederates soldiers ended theirs. Indiana State Fairgrounds map from 1861 city directory (Image: IUPUI Digital archives)Ī most notorious chapter in U.S. history almost immediately thwarted the annual Indianapolis event.
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