Born: 25 September 1864, United States
Died: 13 September 1964
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA
The following is republished from the National Park Service. This piece falls under under public domain, as copyright does not apply to “any work of the U.S. Government” where “a work prepared by an officer or employee of the U.S. Government as part of that person’s official duties” (See, 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 105).
The World’s Columbian Exposition commemorated the 400th anniversary of Christopher Columbus’s landfall in the Americas. From May through October 1893, the Exposition brought people and ideas to Chicago from each of the American states and over 40 countries. Through exhibits and architecture, the Exposition celebrated Western ‘progress,’ including women’s achievements.
In 1891, the Exposition’s Construction Department held a design competition for the Woman’s Building. Only women with formal architectural training could participate. Twenty-one-year-old Sophia Hayden submitted the winning design. She was the first woman to earn a four-year architecture degree from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). During construction, Hayden suffered a “brain fever,” likely a nervous breakdown, from the pressure and the Board of Lady Managers’ demands. The Woman’s Building was her first and last realized building. Lois Lilley Howe received honorable mention in the competition. She completed the two-year “partial course” in architecture at MIT in 1890. Although her design was not chosen, Howe still reached an architectural milestone the year of the Exposition. In 1893, she established the first all-woman architectural firm in the U.S. By 1931, Howe became the first woman recognized as a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects.
Within a year, most Exposition structures, including the Woman’s Building, burnt down or were demolished. Lois Lilley Howe’s home in Cambridge, Massachusetts, the Howe House, was listed in the National Register of Historic Places in 1983.
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