Carol Porter

Writer * Editor * Speaker
Member, Amherst Writers & Artists


Table of Contents

Read an Excerpt

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News Coverage

More about Louis Spiering

Book cover

* 159 pages, 7 ¼" x 10 ½", black-and-white quality paperback
* Released March, 2004 by Virginia Publishing, St. Louis.
* 119 photographs and illustrations, including 45 of Spiering's original, never-before-published views of the fair


Meeting Louis at the Fair
The Projects and Photographs of Louis Clemens Spiering, World's Fair Architect
$23.95

While St. Louis celebrates the centennial of the 1904 World’s Fair, a new book brings the spectacular sights and sounds of the fair together with the intriguing story of a young architect, Louis Spiering.

In Meeting Louis at the Fair, author Carol Porter provides an intimate perspective of the fair through the history of a young architect on the design team.

Spiering’s personal journal of photographs from the World’s Fair, unseen for nearly a century, reveal the fair’s grand undertaking through the young architect’s eyes.


"...truly marvelous. I simply could not stop reading and finished most of it in one evening."
Russell, reader at large

"...singular...comprehensive and persuasive"
Carolyn Hewes Toft, executive director, Landmarks Association of St. Louis

"The graceful prose did not surprise me....But the perseverance through years of scholarly research and the skill in shaping this history into a colorful, compelling narrative simply amazed me. [Porter's] deep appreciation of this man and his work, and understanding of the culture, the politics and the era of the Fair illuminate every page. Wherever Louis now resides, I think he must be smiling."
Nancy Evans, health science writer/editor/consultant; producer, "Rachel's Daughters"

"Carol Porter's book on Louis Clemens Spiering brings to life a major architectural figure who has been too long forgotten. Spiering possessed great talents and helped to make the St. Louis World's Fair into an architectural wonderland. His interests that ranged from beaux-arts classicism to avant-garde secessionism were unusual for the period. Spiering's work at the Fair and in St. Louis were some of the best of the period."
Richard Guy Wilson, Commonwealth Professor, Architectural History, University of Virginia; co-author, "The American Renaissance "

"A great read."
Elizabeth, reader at large