A Woman's Place at the Trans-Mississippi and International Exposition

I argue that women were integral to the success of the Trans-Mississippi Exposition held in Omaha, Nebraska, in 1898. Women were the planners, organizers, workers, and bodies exploited and displayed throughout the fair. This article adds to the Trans-Mississippi Exposition scholarship by writing women into the narrative when the focus has historically been on the male organizers and the impressive Indian Congress held at the fair. Much of the analysis focuses on the Rinehart photo collection to reconstruct women's roles at the fair. World's fairs were cultural havens for exploring a region, society, and even a nation's identity. The Trans-Mississippi Exposition's mission was to celebrate the "conquest and civilization" of the West at an integral time in Great Plains history. Women were vital to the settlement of the area, and to this particular encapsulation of that settlement through the fair.