Souvenirs from the 1933 World's Fair

You might think that even a World's Fair would have a tough time influencing housing design in the middle of the Great Depression on the brink of World War II.

But Chicago's Century of Progress in 1933-34 did just that.

If the house you live in has an open floor plan or a combined living-dining room -- perhaps with an L -- its inspiration could have come from the fair.

Is there any Sheetrock, Masonite or manmade material in your home? What about vinyl or plastic? Even the use of elegant materials like exotic woods or polished metals, not to mention lots of glass or glass block and passive solar heating, show roots in this exposition.

Many of the amenities we take for granted today -- air conditioning, garage doors with electric openers, attached garages, security systems, dishwashers, refrigerators and even the predecessors of television sets were shown off to visitors.

These architectural details were gleaned from "Building a Century of Progress," (University of Minnesota Press, $39.95) and an interview with author, Lisa D. Schrenk. She currently is associate professor of architecture and art history at Norwich University in Northfield, VT, and at one time was education director of the Frank Lloyd Wright Home and Studio Foundation in Oak Park.

At least a dozen homes were built for people to tour at the fair. And they were among the most popular attractions, offering something that fair visitors could dream about building when times got better.

Most were modern designs, although Sears stuck to the ever-popular neocolonial in its choice of a kit house.

"Homes were a way to draw people and make ideas of modernism relevant to the average fairgoer," said Schrenk.

The fair -- on the lakefront where Northerly Island Park and McCormick Place stand today -- is not as famous as the Columbian Exposition, Chicago's first World's Fair in 1893 that marked the beginning of great growth for the city.

"The 1933 fair -- because of the Depression and World War II -- people's attention was elsewhere," said Schrenk. "The last 10 years we have understood the importance of the fair."

The Century of Progress was one of the first and very few fairs to turn a profit. It had 48 million attendees, although many of those represented repeat visits.

The theme was that scientific technology would free the country from the Depression, and manmade materials would make life better for everyone.

Of course, companies wanted to expand their markets and enlarge the consumer culture.

The most famous house, the House of Tomorrow designed by architect George Keck, was visited by 1.25 million people. Each paid 10 cents admission to see this futuristic 12-sided glass house, which owes at least some debt to Buckminster Fuller and his Dymaxion house.

After the fair closed, a developer carried Keck's house and five others on barges to Beverly Shores, Ind. Five of them still stand in the Indiana Dunes National Lake Shore.

The Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana has leased four of the homes to people who agreed to restore them.

They are the Rostone House with synthetic stone, the Cypress House, the Florida Tropical House and the Armco-Ferro Enamel House. This enameled-steel house inspired the Lustron homes built around the suburbs after World War II.

Keck's House of Tomorrow is still available for a 30-year lease.

Other homes might still exist here and there in the suburbs, but Schrenk was not sure of any.

At least a few versions of the Good Housekeeping Stran-Steel House -- apparently the home carried to Indiana and later demolished -- were built around the country. Still-used materials used in it were Formica on its walls and Celotex, which Schrenk said became one of the most popular insulating materials in the mid-twentieth century.

Other houses at the fair:

• National Lumber Manufacturers Association used plywood.

• Masonite Corporation installed many products by that company.

• Union Carbide created three rooms called the Vinylite House in the Hall of Science. The floor was semi-flexible vinyl asbestos tile, and many other plastic products in the home helped pave the way for the public's embrace of plastics after the war.

• Architect Howard T. Fisher built two steel General Houses to demonstrate prefabrication. The company said they could be added to, altered or disassembled.

• Country Home magazine built a farm house in a traditional style with a precasting method of brick construction. The exterior walls are in a basketweave pattern, and because they are reinforced with rods and wood frames they are just one brick thick.

• The Common Brick Manufacturers' Association decided to create a European modernist house. It had porthole and large industrial windows, a flat roof and an irregular hexagonal shape.

• The decorating company W. & J. Sloane built a house with a high-vaulted living room and, would you believe, a rug with a zebra stripe.

• The Design for Living House was also European modern on the exterior. Inside the living room fireplace front was aluminum and the walls were sheathed in copper.

"For many fairgoers, the innovative exposition houses were too impersonal and odd looking," Schrenk writes. "Especially in a time of Depression, most American homeowners were searching for comfort in the familiar."

One goal of Keck and other architects was to convince banks they should finance homes of modern design. This worked for a while.

"More enduring was the general acceptance by financial officers of new materials and methods that could be incorporated into traditional as well as modern, residential designs," the author reported.