Panama-Pacific International Exposition (1915 : San Francisco, Calif.)
Canada.--The Canadian Pavilion is the largest of the foreign buildings,
and the best example at the Exposition of businesslike advertising by a
government. (p. 148.) Planned by a permanent commission which has had
fifteen years of exposition experience, the Canadian exhibit, down to
the last detail, is designed to advertise the country. Even the site, at
the junction of the highways leading to the Live-Stock Section, was
chosen to get the largest number of the kind of visitors Canada is most
anxious to greet. The architects were Humphreys, Limited, of London.
Architecturally, the building is mixed classic, finished in the
Exposition travertine. The maple leaf of Canada appears in medallions on
the walls, the royal arms of Britain over the entrances, and the British
lion on either side of the approaches. Canada's entire exhibit is here.
Her commission cares nothing for awards, but is concerned solely with
attracting settlers and capital.
With this in view, the chief feature of the display consists of Canadian
landscapes, illustrating the agricultural, lumbering, mining, and
shipping interests of British North America. The scenes are set to
produce a remarkable perspective. The beholder seems to stand on rising
ground, looking away over miles of country. In each view the foreground
is enlivened with real water and either living or moving things. There
is a panorama of the great wheat fields bordering on Lake Superior.
Trains move from grain elevators in the interior to the docks on the
lake, where model steamers ply on real water. Electricity supplies the
power.
The largest scene of all is of Canada as it was and as it is. The
foreground represents the North, when the Indian and the game had it to
themselves. In the background the visitor looks for miles down a broad
Canadian valley filled with wheat fields and pleasant farms. Canada's
wild life is represented in the foreground by splendid stuffed
specimens, from the bear and the moose and the musk-ox to the marten and
the muskrat, and from the great gray honker to the hummingbird. On the
right, in a forest scene, is a beaver pond with dam and house, where the
real beavers splash in the water. On the left of the scene, where a
cascade tumbles into it, is a pool of Canadian trout, maintained in the
wonted chill of their native waters by an ice-making plant under the
scenery. Canada hopes to draw wealthy sportsmen and vacationists, who
will then see for themselves the opportunities for investment. Some of
her largest enterprises have begun thus.
The Canadian Pavilion makes no provision for social functions, but it is
an attractive place, where everyone is welcomed. By common consent
Canada has made the most effective exhibit of its kind at the
Exposition.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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