The Palace of Transportation was one of the extremely interesting features of the Exposition. Here could be studied the latest scientific methods of the day in many details not familiar to the general public, as, for instance, the method of handling mails on fast trains and the delivery at stations while the full speed of the train is maintained; many types of marine transportation; and still more of aircraft, the navigation of the air being one of the things constantly demonstrated to throngs of people who were absorbingly interested in the possibilities of aerial flight.
The experimental panorama of the Panama Canal itself was an appropriate feature. At the Exposition in Paris in 1900 the journey on the Trans-Siberian Railway was produced with extraordinary realism. The traveller entered a luxurious train, a very real train comprising drawing-room and dining cars, as well as a library car, and the passing of the long panorama of the entire scenery of that noted route gave a very vivid idea of what one { 242} would see in the actual journey. The California Exposition arranged a similar exhibit of a journey through the Panama Canal. The voyager was invited to the deck of a steamer, and ingenious illusions illustrated the sailing from ocean to ocean.
San Francisco was a gala city through the entire summer. Not the least of the enjoyments were the sails in the splendid local boats, with glass-enclosed decks, across the Bay to Oakland and to Berkeley, the latter city the seat of the University of California. There were excursions for every day in the week for those who wished to vary the scene, and the Exposition itself constantly presented new attractions and new features with the great number of congresses, the numerous lectures, and perpetual fêtes.
The close of the Panama-Pacific Exposition was a scene worthy to live in historic pageantry. The day was one of June dropped into the heart of December. The sun was burning against a cloudless sapphire sky. Within the very radiance of the Tower of Jewels, on one of the terraces of the Court of the Universe, was erected a stand on which were assembled the Directors, the Commissioners of Foreign Governments, the representatives of the Army and Navy of California, and the representatives of the City of San Francisco. From the arches of the Rising and the Setting Sun the sculptured figures looked down. There was orchestral music, and the reading of Mr. Sterling's poem from which lines have been quoted in preceding pages. The { 243} message of Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States, was flashed around the world at the moment it was given to the Exposition. President Wilson well expressed the significance of the undertaking as one "eloquent of the new spirit which is to unite East and West and make all the world partners in the common enterprises of progress and humanity."