Missing Persons: Identity Photography and Workers at the 1893 Chicago World’s Columbian Exposition

Abstract

Identity photographs used for official employee passbooks at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition provide a way to restore visibility to some of the massive workforce of employees and officials who are otherwise missing in conventional representations of this event. As a tool for documentation, a method for the mass production of images and a vehicle for constructing individual identity, identity photography had multiple functions at the Exposition. The professional photographic studio of James and May Gibson, working on site, demonstrates the kind of business acumen that was a requirement for the successful mass production of identity photographs. Workers were the key to successful Exposition businesses, and the food workers and employees of the Wellington Catering Company, the leading food concession, were crucial to the company’s huge financial success. Removed from their original passbooks, 273 photographs of the company’s employees illustrate that for many workers this form of photography was more than just an image of identification, but also an opportunity for a statement of personal identity.