This appalling disaster did not daunt the people of Chicago. They began at once to re build the city and to reconstruct business. While many insurance companies were obliged to sus pend, still some $46,000,000 were realized from this source, and fortunately the bank vaults in every instance but one were found to have preserved their contents intact. Within two years the burnt area was again covered with buildings, and of a more solid type than before the ire.
The Columbian In a World's Fair was held in Chicago, to com memorate the discovery of America four cen turies before. An act of Congress, passed in the spring of 1890, authorized an international exposition in Chicago as an illustration of the development of the new world which Columbus found, made appropriations for the share of the United States government, and provided for a national commission to supervise the work. In Chicago a corporation was formed under the laws of Illinois, to undertake the practical de tails. Funds were provided from private sub scriptions to the stock of the exposition com pany, from a loan of $5,000,000 made by the city, the proceeds of which were devoted to the exposition, from a special appropriation by Congress, from gate receipts snd from various concessions. The site was Jackson Park and the Midway Plaisance, an area of 666 acres being included, with a frontage of two miles on Lake Michigan. Buildings were erected on an elab orate scale, and with taste which met wide approval. J. L. Olmstead planned the land scape work and the architectural work was done by Daniel Burnham and other leading architects. The great building devoted to manufactures had a ground area of nearly 31 acres and a floor and gallery space of 44 acres. In the central hall 75,000 people could be seated, while the entire building would seat 300,000. The standing army of Russia might have been drawn up under its roof. The entire cost of the fair was estimated at upward of $43,000,000. The number of paid admissions throughout the six months from May to November was 21,500,000, the whole number of admissions be ing 27,529,401.
Chicago and the Federal Government.— In Chicago are held United States courts as follows: The Circuit Court of Appeals and the Circuit Court of the seventh judicial circuit, and the District Court of the northern district of Illinois.
The Chicago post office includes the central office, 47 carrier stations, 4 stations without carriers and 302 substations. There are 3,898 employees in the main office and stations and 2,051 carriers and collectors. The receipts for the year 1915 were $23,495,730.76. During the same period the pieces of mail handled num bered 981,037,196 first-class and several million of second- class matter.
By the apportionment under the census of 1910 Illinois has 27 members in the House of Representatives. Six of the Illinois Congres sional districts lie wholly in Chicago and four more arepartly in Chicago. Two representa tives in Congress are elected in the State at large, as the legislature has not redistricted the State on the basis of the last census.
The port of Chicago showed vessels entered for the year 1915 to be 5,055, of a registered tonnage of 7,739,174, while the number cleared for the same period was 5,097 vessels of a tonnage of Of the lake commerce of Chicago in 1915, 8,409,573 tons were received or shipped from the Chicago River, and 7,163,753 tons at the Calumet River. Practically all of the com merce of the Calumet River consisted of iron ore amounting to 4,414,964 tons,' as compared to 2,403,916 tons received at Gary during the same period, and 1,133,193 tons of both hard and soft coal. The lake commerce of Chicago has slightly declined during the past decade, even though there has been a large increase of tonnage received and shipped from the Calu met harbor, at the south end of the city. This is largely due to the obstructions in the Chi cago River by bridges and to the crookedness of the river. The city has recently completed a $5,000,000 pier extending 3,000 feet into the lake for the use of passenger boats and pack age freight. In 1915 the amount of package freight received at the Chicago River amounted to 824,754 tons and the shipments were 432,678 tons. The receipts of the Chicago custom house for 1914 were $9,147,600. The internal revenue receipts for the same year were $15, 947,189.89, or a total of $25,094,789.89.