Archives Puzzles: The Woman’s Building

Each Monday, sit back, relax, and ease into the work week with puzzles created from images in our collections that have been designated as open access. Anyone can now download, transform, share, and reuse these images as part of Smithsonian Open Access, launched in 2020.

This week’s puzzle features the Woman’s Building at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893. The building was designed by Sophia Hayden, the first woman to graduate with a degree in architecture from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 

As a way to include women in the planning without actually saving them a seat on the Board of Governors, the all-male group of planners approved the construction of a separate building to exhibit the achievements of women and established a “Board of Lady Managers.” When Black women petitioned for space on the planning board, they were refused. As historian Anna Massa wrote in 1974, Fannie Barrier Williams was the only Black woman to hold a professional role, and she was unpaid for her secretarial position. Read more about representation at the fair from activist and lawyer Rachel B. Tiven.

The Original 

The Puzzle