World's Fair artifacts valuable if real

Many of today’s antiques and collectibles originated at world’s fairs. Here on the Pacific Coast, there have been a number of international expositions, as they are formally called, ranging from Portland in 1905 to Vancouver, British Columbia’s “Expo ’86,” almost 30 years ago. In today’s What’s It Worth? we examine a reader’s quite special artifacts from a fair that — 100 years ago — redefined a city.

Q. About 10 years ago I purchased two sculptural “heads,” which seem to me to be made of a type of clay. An elderly lady told me they came from the Palace of Fine Arts at the 1915 San Francisco World’s Fair. The story is that she and her husband were walking through the site shortly after the fair had closed. They saw the heads on the sidewalk and asked a nearby workman if they could have them. He said, “Sure, we’re tearing these buildings down.” A few days later, the couple returned to see if more artifacts were available, only to find the site had been fenced off and no entry was allowed. Each of the heads is about 16 by 20 inches. Do these have any real value? — Cliff in Prosser

A. These might be unusual and rare survivors of the Panama-Pacific Exposition, as the 1915 San Francisco World’s Fair was called. The fair ran from February to December and officially commemorated the opening of the Panama Canal.

In reality, San Franciscans were showing the world how their city had bounced back from the devastating earthquake and fire just nine years earlier.

The fair was a dazzling display of all that was modern. Staged on 635 acres in the city’s Marina District, it featured buildings designed by America’s leading architects. Renowned artists created sculptures, fountains and courtyards.

Included in the list of notables were architects Ernest Cox and Bernard Maybeck, the firm of McKim, Mead & White, and artists such as Alexander Stirling Calder and James Frazier, whose famous End of the Trail statue was unveiled at the fair.

All in all, the exposition was considered by many to be the finest world’s fair ever staged. Two million people attended. When the fair ended on Dec. 4,1915, demolition of the buildings began almost immediately.

As has always been the case with expositions, none of the structures were designed to be permanent; they simply couldn’t last much longer than the run of the fair. Constructed of wood and covered with “staff” — a mixture of plaster and burlap-type fiber — they would have quickly deteriorated.

One building, however, struck a chord with San Francisco’s residents and — even before the fair closed — a committee of prominent citizens was formed to raise money to save the Palace of Fine Arts. They were successful, even though the building was at least partially razed. The completely rebuilt Palace of Fine Arts stands today on its original site as a theater, events center and gallery.

Cliff’s “architectural artifacts” from the fair may well have come from the Palace of Fine Arts, or one of the other nine “Palaces” on the fairgrounds.

Identical lions can be seen on the arches of the rotunda of today’s structure, although we couldn’t find evidence of the sheep sculpture.

Important and certainly rare artifacts of one of the seminal events in San Francisco’s history, they do have market value. Seldom offered for sale, we found limited sales records of similar items and no exact matches.

If the lion and sheep can be shown to have come from the Palace of Fine Arts, their value is enhanced because they were designed by Bernard Maybeck.

That is a name that may not be familiar in the Northwest, but is famous in California and to fans of the Arts and Crafts Movement of the early 20th century. He is considered a visionary, and any works by Maybeck are actively sought.

A smaller architectural fragment designed by Maybeck — the head of a woman measuring 9 by 9 inches and from the Palace of Fine Arts — sold at auction in the San Francisco area four years ago for $1,500.

This story was originally published January 10, 2015 at 12:00 AM with the headline "World's Fair artifacts valuable if real."