On May 1, 1851, a crowd of three hundred thousand people gathered in Hyde Park, London. Only thirty thousand held tickets, but the excitement of the day was too great to keep the masses away. They watched with pride as Queen Victoria and her consort, Prince Albert, led a procession of dignitaries to a grand, new building of iron and glass called the Crystal Palace. It was the opening of the Great Exhibition!
The Great Exhibition of 1851 was the largest display of technology, industry, art, and culture the world had ever seen. Inside the Crystal Palace, exhibit-goers could get a glimpse of the biggest diamond in the world, a carriage drawn by kites, a full-sized steam locomotive, and treasures from India and China. In its central court, concerts, performances, and even a circus entertained the crowds. In the park outside, people could stroll or picnic among impressive fountains, waterfalls, and a myriad of statues, including models of dinosaurs.
Thirty-two countries sent products for the exhibition, and nations from as far away as Africa and South America had displays. Nearly 14,000 exhibits were on show—all the miracles of the new industrial age, from printing presses and industrial looms to a new process for preserving milk. France ontributed the second-greatest number of exhibits, showcasing luxury goods like rich fabrics and elegant furniture; the greatest number of exhibits came, not surprisingly, from England.
For England, the Great Exhibition was more than an international fair; it was a display of national pride. England was the world’s leading manufacturer and the birthplace of the Industrial Revolution, which was changing society across Europe and around the world. In the nineteenth century, the invention of the steam-powered engine and the development of great industrial plants led to many new tools and products that rapidly changed daily life. People increasingly earned their living in factories rather than on farms. In fact, the year of the Great Exhibition, 1851, was the first year that more people in England lived in the cities than in the countryside.
Prince Albert, as the president of the Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, spearheaded the event’s organization. He was a believer in utilitarianism, which held that human effort ought to be organized for the benefit of all humankind. Prince Albert took a keen interest in applying science to the manufacturing industry, and he encouraged England’s scientists and inventors to showcase their newest technologies.
The building that housed these exhibits was perhaps a more dramatic demonstration of modern engineering than anything inside it. Over half a kilometer long and 124 meters wide, the Crystal Palace rose in three tiers to a height of 33 meters—high enough to enclose towering elm trees. Its glass was held in place by 9,640 tons of iron, and the structure provided almost a million square meters of display space.
The Crystal Palace was designed by Joseph Paxton, a respected gardener and someone who had spent years designing greenhouses. The committee in charge of the new building’s construction had reviewed 250 proposals and developed their own, but none of the designs appealed to everyone. Paxton’s plan was chosen because it was cheaper and easier to build. The Crystal Palace was an early example of a prefabricated building, and the largest of its kind at the time. All its components were manufactured at ironworks or glassworks outside London, and then shipped to Hyde Park to be assembled. After the design had been finalized, the whole building was completed in a brief nine months.
To the modern eye, the new technologies displayed at the Great Exhibition are not so impressive, but at the time, many were without precedent. The first automobile designs were presented, as well as a demonstration of basic electric power. The nineteenth century was the beginning of the modern age, and these exhibits allowed people to see firsthand the marvels of the era they lived in.
The great crowds who attended were themselves a manifestation of the changing society. In the five and a half months the exhibition was open, six million people visited the fair, with many coming from abroad. Almost one quarter of the population of England passed through the gates. The mass movement of people to the Great Exhibition was facilitated by the new railways of the time. Across the country, clergy and teachers organized field trips for schoolchildren, employers paid for members of their staff to visit, and mayors of distant towns even offered sponsorships so their citizens could go. For many, the trip to the Great Exhibition was the first major journey of their lives. To some Londoners, the farmers who traveled from the county of Kent wearing their traditional smocks looked more outlandish than the visitors from foreign countries.
Not only did people from all parts of the country mix at the Great Exhibition, but people from all walks of life mingled there too. Both the elite and the common folk strolled the park’s paths and the structure’s walkways. England was one of the few European countries not to have recently experienced a violent revolution in which the lower classes rose up against the nobility. So, naturally, there was concern that the event’s large crowds might erupt into violence. A new division of London’s Metropolitan Police with one thousand men was stationed at the fair to maintain public order. The Metropolitan Police was one of the world’s first civilian law-enforcement bodies, and the efforts it took to maintain public order during the exhibition continued after it closed. The success of the Great Exhibition demonstrated the success of the new society that was emerging.
The close of the exhibition on October 15, 1851, raised the question of what to do with the Crystal Palace. While some people wanted the structure to remain permanently, others wanted it torn down and Hyde Park returned to its former state. A solution was reached when investors raised money to disassemble the building and erect it in a new location. In 1854, the Crystal Palace was moved to Sydenham Hill in South London, where it remained until a fire destroyed it in 1936. Its original foundation can still be found in Hyde Park today.
The memories of the Great Exhibition have not faded; it is considered a pivotal moment in England’s history. Some displays from the 1851 fair were given new homes in the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Science Museum, both of which were funded by the exhibition’s profits.
The world’s fair held in New York in 1853 and the many fairs that followed were all inspired by London’s Great Exhibition. The 1889 International Exhibition featured its own magnificent prefabricated iron structure—the Eiffel Tower. The world’s fairs that continue to be held around the globe all originate in the great success of the summer of 1851.