All the World is Here!

"This entrancing book looks at (the clash of class and caste withinthe black community).... An important reexamination of African Americanhistory."
-- Choice The 1893 World's ColumbianExposition in Chicago showed the world that America had come of age. Dreaming thatthey could participate fully as citizens, African Americans flocked to the fair bythe thousands. "All the World Is Here!" examines why they came and theways in which they took part in the Exposition. Their expectations varied.Well-educated, highly assimilated African Americans sought not just representationbut also membership at the highest level of decision making and planning. Theywanted to participate fully in all intellectual and cultural events. Instead, theywere given only token roles and used as window dressing. Their stories of pathos andjoy, disappointment and hope, are part of the lost history of "WhiteCity." Frederick Douglass, who embodied the dream that inclusion within theAmerican mainstream was possible, would never forget America's World's Fairsnub.