Voices from the Fair

Description

This book contains a collection of speeches given at the 1919 Centenary Celebration of American Methodist Missions. In a joint endeavor the Methodist Episcopal Church, the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church staged a Protestant missionary exposition at the state fairgrounds in Columbus, Ohio. The three-week ‘world’s fair of Methodism’ attracted over one million visitors and in many ways reflected earlier world’s fairs and Protestant missionary exhibitions held in England and the United States by featuring international pavilions, live ethnographic displays, advances in technology, and a miniature midway. Northern and Southern Methodists as well as persons affiliated with other Protestant denominations attended the event which emphasized missionary education and the propagation of Christianity and American democracy throughout the world.

The intended purpose of this work is to produce an edited collection of previously unavailable primary documents for contemporary scholars and the general reading public. The specific themes within this collection include issues of race, gender, national prohibition, and the American nation. Persons interested in the original words of the people, ideas and implicit themes of early 20th America should find this collection a valuable resource.