The Postcard
A stereoscopic view card that was published by the London Stereoscopic and Photographic Company. There is no information on the reverse of the card.
The International Exhibition of 1862
The International Exhibition of 1862, or Great London Exposition, was a world's fair. It was held from the 1st. May to the 15th. November 1862, beside the gardens of the Royal Horticultural Society, South Kensington, London, England, on a site that now houses museums including the Natural History Museum and the Science Museum.
It attracted 6,096,617 visitors who viewed contributions from 39 countries.
Organisation of The Exhibition
The exhibition was sponsored by the Royal Society of Arts, Manufactures and Trade, and featured over 28,000 exhibitors representing a wide range of industry, technology, and the arts. Receipts (£459,632) were slightly above cost (£458,842), leaving a total profit of £790.
The buildings, which occupied 21 acres, were designed by Captain Francis Fowke of the Royal Engineers, and built by Charles and Thomas Lucas and Sir John Kelk at a cost of £300,000 covered by profits from the Great Exhibition of 1851.
They were intended to be permanent, and were constructed in an un-ornamented style with the intention of adding decoration in later years as funds allowed.
Much of the construction was of cast-iron, 12,000 tons worth, though façades were brick. Picture galleries occupied three sides of a rectangle on the south side of the site; the largest, with a frontage on the Cromwell Road, was 1150 feet long, 50 feet high and 50 feet wide, with a grand triple-arched entrance. Fowke paid particular attention to lighting pictures in a way that would eliminate glare.
Behind the picture galleries were the "Industrial Buildings" . These were composed of "naves" and "transepts", lit by tall clerestories, with the spaces in the angles between them filled by glass-roofed courts. Above the brick entrances on the east and west fronts were two great glass domes, each 150 feet wide and 260 feet high - at that time the largest domes ever built. The timber-framed "Machinery Galleries", the only parts of the structure intended to be temporary, stretched further north along Prince Consort Road.
The opening took place on the 1st. May 1862. Queen Victoria, still in mourning for her consort Prince Albert did not attend, instead her cousin the Duke of Cambridge presided from a throne sited beneath the western dome. An opening address was delivered by the Earl Granville, chairman of Her Majesty's Commissioners, the group responsible for the organisation of the event. William Sterndale Bennett composed music for the opening ceremony.
An official closing ceremony took place on the 1st. November 1862, but the exhibition remained open to the public until the 15th. November 1862.
Parliament declined the Government's wish to purchase the building, and the materials were sold and used for the construction of Alexandra Palace.
Babbage's Analytical Engine and Other Exhibits
The exhibition was a showcase for the advances made in the industrial revolution , especially in the decade since the first Great Exhibition of 1851. Among the items on display were; the electric telegraph, submarine cables, the first plastic, Parkesine, machine tools, looms and precision instruments.
Exhibits included such large pieces of machinery as parts of Charles Babbage's analytical engine, cotton mills, and maritime engines. There was also a range of smaller goods including fabrics, rugs, sculptures, furniture, plates, porcelain, silver and glass wares, and wallpaper.
The manufacture of ice by an early refrigerator caused a sensation.
The work shown by William Morris's decorative arts firm of Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. attracted much notice. The exposition also introduced the use of caoutchouc for rubber production and the Bessemer process for steel manufacture.
The London and North Western Railway exhibited one of their express passenger locomotives, Lady of the Lake. A sister locomotive, Watt had famously carried Trent Affair despatches earlier that year, but the Lady of the Lake (which won a bronze medal at the exhibition) was so popular that the entire class of locomotive became known as Ladies of the Lake.
A large tiger skin, shot in 1860 by Colonel Charles Reid, was exhibited here. The skin was mounted by Edwin H. Ward and subsequently became "The Leeds Tiger", still on display at Leeds City Museum.
Benjamin Simpson showed photos from the Indian subcontinent.
Photographs of the Exhibition
William England led a team of stereoscopic photographers to produce a series of 350 stereo views of the exhibition for the London Stereoscopic Company. The images were made using the new collodion wet plate process which allowed exposure times of only a few seconds. These images provide a vivid three-dimensional record of the exhibition. They were on sale to the public in boxed sets, and were delivered to the Queen by messenger so that she could experience the exhibition from her seclusion in mourning.
Music at The Exhibition
Unlike The Great Exhibition of 1851, the Society of Arts chose to have a distinctive musical component to the exhibition of 1862. Music critic Henry Chorley was selected as advisor, and recommended commissioning works by William Sterndale Bennett, Giacomo Meyerbeer, Daniel Auber, and Gioacchino Rossini. Being in his retirement, Rossini declined, so the Society asked Giuseppe Verdi, who eventually accepted.
William Sterndale Bennett wrote his Ode for the opening of the International Exhibition (upon a text by Alfred, Lord Tennyson). Meyerbeer wrote his Fest-Ouvertüre im Marschstil, and Auber wrote his Grand triumphal march. These three works premiered at the opening of the exhibition, with the orchestra led by conductor Prosper Sainton.
Controversies involving Verdi's contribution, the Cantata Inno Delle Nazioni, prevented the work from being included in the inaugural concert. It was first performed on the 24th. May 1862 at Her Majesty's Theatre in a concert organized by James Henry Mapleson.
The pianist Ernst Pauer performed daily piano recitals on the stage under the western dome.
The Opening Ceremony Accident
At the opening of the exhibition on the 1st. May 1862, one of the attending Members of the British Parliament, 70-year-old Robert Aglionby Slaney, fell onto the ground through a gap between floorboards on a platform. He carried on with his visit despite an injured leg, but gangrene set in, and he died on the 19th. May.
