Symbol: The White City
The ‘White City’ represents the American dream and the glory of the country’s accomplishments. So much pressure was put on the architects of the fair to make it glorious because of what it represents; the fair had to be a shining spectacle in order to prove that America was as cultured and glorious as Paris. Furthermore, the color white as the choice for the buildings emphasizes America's purity, perfection, and harmony.
Symbol: Union Yards
The stockyards that are the biggest industry in Chicago represent the ‘Black City’: Chicago’s reputation as a dirty, second-class city. They fill the city with the smell of blood and rotting animals, and create the image the architects are trying to wipe clean with the World’s Fair. They are paralleled in the behavior and appearance of the city outside the stockyards, with the sewage, crime, garbage, corruption, and murder.
Symbol: The Turnstile
Nearing the end of the book, when Holmes finally attempts to attend the Fair, he is forced to pay up. “At the fair’s turnstiles even Holmes could not escape paying cash” (265). The turnstiles here are symbolic of Holmes’ downfall, and of the idea that no one can escape their problems or their actions’ consequences forever.
Symbol: Meeting Between Leaders
When Susan B. Anthony interacts with Buffalo Bill Cody on page 286, the leader of the Wild West Show bows and suffragette waves her handkerchief. This passing interaction symbolized the shifting of American culture and morals from a conservative ‘man’s world’ to one that put a higher value on equality.
Symbol: Holmes's Building
Holmes's building is a symbol for the man himself. When Dr. Cigrand visits, he finds the building "gloomy and imposing, out of spirit with its surrounding structure" (166). It is "dead space, like the corner of a room where the gaslight could not reach" (166). Holmes is dark, strange, and a place where light cannot reach; his building perfectly encapsulates him in that it might initially seem appealing but the closer one looks, the more disconcerting the picture is.
