Queen of the Joy Zone Meets Hercules: Gendering Imperial California at the Panama-Pacific International Exposition

Abstract

San Francisco’s 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition relied on female bodies and beauty to solidify the city’s and state’s imperial claims. Publicists and exhibitors used women’s bodies to advertise the city, fair, and state at the same time amusement concessions displayed them in ways that reaffirmed racial hierarchies. In a reflection of the expansion of white women’s claims to public space, the fair’s Woman’s Board worked to make the fair safe for unaccompanied women and affirmed their status vis-a-vis nonwhite women. Economic interests and changing gender ideals intertwined to expand white women’s public presence at the exposition while simultaneously celebrating American expansionism and the contemporary racial hierarchy.