Early in June of 1876, officials and a great host of military men, as well as hosts of admiring friends of the gallant, picturesque General George Armstrong Custer, who made a brilliant record during the Civil War, were deeply shocked and saddened by the news of his untimely death in the terrible massacre of the Little Big Horn on June 25, 1876. For several years, much interest had centred around the celebration of the anniversary of the One Hundredth Year of the Independence of the United States. The principal feature of this was the opening of the great Centennial Exposition in Fairmount Park, Philadelphia, in the spring of 1876. The huge building of glass and iron covered a space of about seventy-five acres. To this exhibition all nations of the world sent samples of their art, industry, or manufacture, but the United States led in the display of inventions, which demonstrated that an industrial revolution had developed. The great progress in time- and labour-saving devices made a lasting impression upon the visitors. Two of the remarkable novelties shown at that time were the electric light and Professor A. G. Bell’s invention of the telephone. An amusing incident that had been induced by the approach of the Centennial was the notion expressed in the following article which appeared in the _Star_ of May 29, 1875: “Among the lively bids for the success of the Centennial, made by the managers, is a circular sent out to the Governors of the States, asking each of them to furnish the names of not less than fifty men who in 1876 will have reached the age of one hundred years. It is proposed to supply free transportation to the centennial exhibition to all centenarians and to entertain them as the Nation’s guests. The New York _Herald_ raises a phantom of alarm in the wide demoralization of the aged community involved in this project. The number of aged men who are in training for the Centennial, it says, would startle the country were it known. Dazzled by the honours which are bestowed upon the centenarians, many of these individuals have gone, like prize fighters, into a regular course of training to qualify themselves for an appearance at the exhibition next year. The result will be that next year it will be as hard to find an old man of 80 as it is now to find one of 100.”