The Devil in the White City follows the exploits of two men with radically different lives, yet they still bare similarities to one another. The first is Daniel Burnham, the architect challenged with the task of making the 1893 World's Fair in Chicago stand out with an attraction to rival the Eiffel tower. The second central character, and serving as the other side of the coin to Burnham, is Dr. H.H. Holmes; a career criminal, pharmacist and serial killer who designed elaborate traps and mechanisms designed to increase the ease of his kills and disposal of bodies. The lives of these two men are told as two separate stories until they quickly become intertwined, when Holmes arrives in Chicago in anticipation of the World's Fair, hoping to…
Publishing Group, 2003, and 447 The book "The Devil in the White City" is about the serial killer H.H. Holmes and the architect of the World's Fair Daniel H. Burnham. Who was Daniel H. Burnham? Burnham was a man who rose to prominence. In 1893 Chicago won the bid for the World's Exposition. The architects chosen were Burnham and his partner John Root, Burnham and John needed to build something to give their city a better reputation. Burnham ended facing many hardships along the way, it started…
simultaneously tells the stories of the architects who designed the 1893 World’s Fair in Chicago, and a serial killer who took advantage of the World Fair to kill several unsuspecting tourists. Larson contrasts the brilliance of the fair’s architects with the madness of the villainous murderer. By simultaneously telling these stories, Larson demonstrates the two sides of humanity: the greatness that is possible in its builders, and the evil that lurks in its destroyers. The architects plot…
“I was born with the devil in me. I could not help the fact that I was a murderer, no more than the poet can help the inspiration to sing” (Larson 109.) In the book, The Devil in the White City, Burnham, an architect, is having many different struggles in building the World’s Fair by opening day, but after the many struggles he ends up making the fair a dreamland. At the same time, Holmes, the first serial killer, is luring young women into his hotel and killing them without getting caught;…
that accompanied the construction of the fair. This book exhibits America’s determination to surmount all of the dilemmas that occurred. Despite the weather conditions and the unfinished look of the fair, Burnham and his peers were able to get the job done and make the fair…
Sometimes, he would fill the hotel rooms with gas and his guests would silently die in their sleep, or he would use chloroform soaked rags and suffocated them to death. After he murdered his guests, he would then burn their bodies at the bottom of the hotel’s basement. From these crimes, Holmes is said to be one of America’s first known serial killers (Larson, 2003). Furthermore, building the fair was a long and brutal process since it had to be completed in a short about of time. Daniel H.…
During the summer of the years 1133 to 1855 a famous fair came into London, most commonly known as the Bartholomew Fair. Hosted in Smithfield, otherwise known as the location popular for slaughterhouses and public executions, the fair was a trading event that attracted Londoners of all classes. Ben Jonson uses this factor to his advantage with his play entitled, “Bartholomew Fair.” The type of people, activities, and crimes that occur at the fair gives Jonson the opportunity to reflect on his…
‘Chicago’ Carl Sandburg The poem ‘Chicago’ by Carl Sandburg describes the city of Chicago in the United States of America, presumably at the time of writing, 1914. Sandburg is first speaking to the city, then speaking to the people who is reading the poem. Sandburg has described Chicago as a city of the big shoulders, busy and brawling. Sandburg’s deep affection for his city arises, in spite of the outsiders staring at the hard working people who colonise the city. He makes us imagine Chicago…
In Larson’s book The Devil in the White City, Larson portrays Jackson Park, the location of the Chicago World’s Fair, in different ways, based on the characters’ knowledge of the park. He uses three characters’ quotes and thoughts to give the reader an image of the park: Olmsted, Burnham, and the east coast architects. The image he gives the reader is never perfect, but the first impression he gives the reader is acceptable. At first, Larson describes Jackson Park as a place that may not have…
Propaganda in “The Jungle” The Jungle by Upton Sinclair is a novel exploiting the lives of Lithuanian immigrants in Chicago during the Industrial Revolution of the early 19th century. The immigrants have a goal of achieving the American dream, and as the story goes on they are faced with the horrors of the meat packing industry. Upton Sinclair is a yellow journalist and muckraker during the progressive era, therefore the story is bound to have exaggeration in order for him to succeed in…