Expo-nential.

First thing you gotta know about worlds fairs is that they have a governing body. An official entity that covers the whole fair/exposition thing. Not surprisingly it's called the Bureau of International Expositions. One may have expected an office but a bureau is nice. Classy. They were founded in 1928, which is surprising since fairs have been a part of the human landscape for centuries. Thanks God they organized when they did.

OK, to get the ball rolling let us journey to England, the year is 1760 to an event called the First Exhibition. Though not a "worlds" fair it was nevertheless real big for the time, and in fairs that's what counts.

Sponsored by the Royal Society of Arts it featured a series of exhibitions showcasing not so much the artistic abilities of the crafts people but their manufacturing and commercializing ability. Examples of tapestry, carpets and porcelain competed for prizes.

The following year there was an exhibition of agricultural methods and machinery. Bet it was hard to get a ticket for that. The RSA got into a whole lot more exhibitions over the next 100 years or so. More on that in another post.

And, just so you know, the Royal Society instituted a tree planting program in the 1750's (50 million trees planted) to offset the deforestation by Britain's shipbuilding industry. Them's a lot of boats.