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The first sight visitors encountered at London鈥檚 Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations in 1851 was a 27-foot glass fountain that continuously dispensed Schweppes naturally carbonated spring water sourced from the Malvern Hills in England.聽
Then as they looked around, they were awed by the gargantuan size of the Crystal Palace they had entered, the largest enclosed space that had ever been built. Constructed in Hyde Park of glass panels supported by a cast iron frame, the structure was 1,851 feet long, a clever nod to the year of the exhibition. The building鈥檚 height was also impressive. Rather than chopping down giant elm trees that grew in the park, architect Joseph Paxton simply built the glass ceiling high enough to accommodate them.
The exhibition was largely the brainchild of Prince Albert, Queen Victoria鈥檚 husband who was a great supporter of both the sciences and the arts. Although the aim was largely to celebrate Britain鈥檚 accomplishments, 34 other countries were also invited to mount displays.聽
The U.S featured Cyrus McCormick鈥檚 mechanical reaper, Samuel Colt鈥檚 revolver, and Charles Goodyear鈥檚 vulcanized rubber. India鈥檚 exhibit included the famous Koh-i-noor, at the time the world鈥檚 largest known diamond, and of all things, a giant stuffed elephant. France displayed the Gobelin Tapestries, an array of perfumes, and 鈥淶inc White,鈥� a synthetic zinc pigment produced by combining zinc vapour with oxygen that was promoted as a non-toxic alternative to lead paint. Germany showed off Alfred Krupp鈥檚 flawless steel ingots, and Russia displayed furs, Cossack armour and beautiful vases made of green malachite.
Canada showed off the country鈥檚 agricultural wealth with barrels of corn, oats, peas and beans, and of course people got a taste of maple syrup. A large Native American bark canoe and snowshoes hung over the display area, but the crown jewel was an award-winning collection of various minerals and metal ores assembled by geologist William Logan, who was later knighted by Queen Victoria for masterminding the display.
To organize the scientific exhibits, Prince Albert enlisted Lyon Playfair, a chemist who had trained under famed Justus von Liebig in Germany and was known for his lectures on the means by which chemistry could improve everyday life. His philosophy was reflected in the various scientific exhibits and demonstrations that attracted large crowds of visitors who were fascinated by glistening samples of iodine, blocks of sulphur, and giant crystals of alum used in textile dying and leather tanning industries.
Although William Henry Perkin would not discover synthetic dyes for another five years, there were plenty of natural dyes on display. Silks, cotton fabrics and carpets dyed blue with indigo, black with logwood, or red with madder root or cochineal insect extract attracted the public鈥檚 eye.聽
There were also crystallized forms of the medicines extracted at the time from plants, namely quinine for malaria, morphine for pain and strychnine 鈥渢o invigorate vitality.鈥� The public also marvelled at natural products originating from India such as cannabis known at the time as tincture of 鈥淚ndian Hemp鈥� which was gaining traction in Victorian medicine as a sedative and pain killer. Should nature call, visitors had the chance to experience the first public flushing toilets.聽
Technology was also widely featured. There were demonstrations of soap and candle making, electroplating, cotton spinning and glass manufacture. A prototype submarine built by American inventor Lodner Darvantis Phillips was a popular attraction, as was a sample of the gutta percha-coated submarine cable that was successfully used to connect Dover to Calais in France that very year.聽
The public also saw up close the two-needle telegraph with which William Cooke and Charles Wheatstone had revolutionized communication. To convey a specific letter, an operator manipulated keys to send electrical currents down two wires that caused magnetic needles on a board to move and point to the letter.
Frederick Bakewell鈥檚 鈥渃opying telegraph,鈥� a precursor of the fax machine, was also on display. This remarkable device worked by the sender writing a message with insulating ink on a metal foil wrapped around a rotating cylinder. A metal stylus moved across the cylinder and caused a current to flow except when interrupted by the insulating ink. At the receiving end, another rotating cylinder was covered in paper on which a stylus made markings according to the electrical signal received.
London gunsmith Joseph Lang had designed a fully operational sporting rifle disguised as a gentleman鈥檚 walking cane for the exhibit. It could even be wrapped in fabric to resemble an umbrella. This was long before the Bulgarian secret police assassinated dissident Georgi Markov in London with such a device in 1978.聽
In a somewhat comical demonstration, long before Houdini made lock-picking a form of entertainment, American locksmith Alfred Charles Hobbs embarrassed British locksmiths by publicly showing that supposedly secure locks could be readily picked.
Should nature call, visitors had the chance to experience the first public flushing toilets. Designed by sanitary engineer George Jennings and amusingly named 鈥渕onkey closets鈥� 鈥� because, from the side, the bowl resembled a squatting monkey 鈥� the toilets themselves became a major attraction. The entry fee of a penny gave rise to the euphemism 鈥渢o spend a penny鈥� for going to the toilet.聽
By the time the Crystal Palace closed its doors in October 1851, 6 million people had visited. Queen Victoria, who had officially opened the exhibition in May, visited some 37 times! Whether she ever used the toilet is not known.
The Palace was disassembled and reassembled in an expanded version in south London as an entertainment and exhibit complex and remained a beloved landmark until it was tragically destroyed by a fire in 1936. The district is still known today as Crystal Palace, which is also the name of the football team that plays its home games there at Selhurst Park.聽The only remnants of the rebuilt Crystal Palace are the first-ever life-size three-dimensional models of prehistoric creatures that were built by sculptor Benjamin Hawkins in the park surrounding the Palace.
The original exhibit was financially very successful, with the profits being used to buy a large plot of land in Kensington that came to be known as 鈥淎lbertopolis鈥� in honour of Prince Albert. It now houses the London Science Museum, the Natural History Museum, the Victoria and Albert Museum and the Royal Albert Hall. Probably my favourite place in the world to visit.
Next time you buy a Schweppes beverage, take a look at the label. You will see a stylized logo of the Crystal Palace fountain that has become the emblem of the company. I wish I could have seen the real thing.
