t Riot grew out of a strike in the McCormick
harvester works. Hostility against the employers had been
fomented by a group of so-called International Anarchists and the
struggle culminated at the Anarchist meeting at the Haymarket
Square. When the authorities said that the speeches were too
revolutionary to be allowed to continue and the police undertook
to disperse the meeting, a bomb was thrown and seven policemen
were killed. Seven anarchists were ultimately convicted as being
conspirators and accomplices and were condemned to death. Four
were hanged, one committed suicide, two had their death sentences
commuted to life imprisonment, and eight anarchists were
sentenced to imprisonment for 15 years. In 1893 Gov. Altgeld
pardoned those still in prison.

The leader of the Pullman strike, which began in the Pullman car
works, was Eugene Debs (1855), who was the Socialist candidate
for President in the election of 1920, although he was then in
the penitentiary at Atlanta for violating the Espionage Act
during the World War. The strike spread to the railways, and
caused great disorder until President Cleveland dispatched
federal troops to Chicago.

The exposition was an artistic and educational triumph, and its
influence on the progress of the city cannot be overestimated The
exposition gave Chicago an artistic conscience one of the direct results
of which was the organization of the City Plan Commission, a body which
is at work reshaping the city in the interests of greater beauty and
utility.

The exposition commemorated the 400th anniversary of the
discovery of America by Columbus. It was held in Jackson Park, on
the south side of the city, and covered an area of 686 acres. The
buildings (planned by a commission of architects of which D.H.
Burnham was the chief) formed a collection of remarkable beauty,
to which the grounds (planned by F.L. Olmsted), intersected by
lagoons and bordered by a lake, lent an appropriate setting. The
fair was opened to the public May 1, 1893, and the total number
of admissions was 27,500,000. The total cost was more than
$33,000,000.

Owing largely to its central position and to its excellent railroad
facilities, Chicago has been a favorite city for national political
conventions ever since the nomination of Lincoln Others nominated here
have been Grant (1866 and 1872), G