On June 21, 1893, the world’s very first Ferris Wheel carried its first public passengers into the sky at the World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, Illinois. Standing an incredible 264 feet tall, the massive engineering marvel was a breathtaking spectacle for visitors.
This mechanical wonder was engineered by George Washington Gale Ferris Jr. as America’s direct, defiant answer to the Eiffel Tower, which had stolen the global spotlight at the Paris Exposition a few years earlier. While French critics confidently predicted the fragile-looking American wheel would collapse under its own weight, the steam-powered wheel proved to be a masterpiece of structural physics. Each of its 36 massive cars could hold up to 60 people, giving amazed riders a view of Lake Michigan that felt entirely sci-fi for the 19th century.
Image: The original Ferris Wheel at the 1893 World Columbian Exposition in Chicago via Wikimedia Commons, public domain
