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Panama-Pacific International Exposition Pennant. Oversized Panama-Pacific International Exposition

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Historical Memorabilia Start Price:1.00 USD Estimated At:400.00 - 600.00 USD
Panama-Pacific International Exposition Pennant.  Oversized Panama-Pacific International Exposition
<B> Oversized Panama-Pacific International Exposition Pennant </B></I> This boldly colored and eye-catching pennant measures 24 1/2 inches tall at its tallest point and 58 inches long. The pennant was an official souvenir from the 1915 Exposition in San Francisco, California. The exposition was set up to celebrate the completion of the Panama Canal, and it also commemorated the 400th anniversary of the discovery of the Pacific Ocean by Balboa. The city constructed a 635 acre area on the mud flats between Van Ness and the Presidio. This pennant features the most recognized and most extravagant building of the exposition, "The Tower of Jewels." It stood over 43 stories tall, and was covered with more than 100,000 glass jewels that dangled individually off the structure to shimmer and bounce the sunlight off of them. Benjamin Macomber, one of the architects, speaking about the tower said, "...towering above everything else, it is at once the culminating point and the center of the exposition...it links everything...it is intended to be the first thing seen from afar, the point from which the eye travels to lesser things on either hand." <BR><BR> Occasionally the exposition would put on an event known as the "Burning Tower," (according to Todd's <I>The Story of the Exposition</B></I>) during which the tower would be described as "Concealed ruby lights, and pants of red fire behind the colonnades on the different galleries, seemed to turn the whole gigantic structure into a pyramid of incandescent metal, glowing toward white heat and about to melt. From the great vaulted base to the top of the sphere, it had the unstable effulgence of a charge in a furnace, and yet it did not melt, however much you expected it to, but stood and burned like some sentient thing doomed to eternal torment." <BR><BR> Sometimes during the exposition, they would sell new gems as souvenirs, but when the exposition closed, the actual gems from the tower were sold for one dollar each. While this pennant is not an actual gem from the tower, it is no less impressive. Its huge size and pristine condition commemorate one of the most amazing buildings ever built for a fair or exposition in history. The flag shows no signs of wear, its colors are bold and bright like new! A great piece of history!