We felt that we must improve on previous showings made by the State at
other Expositions, or resign and ask that the responsibility be placed
in other hands, or that the money be allowed to remain in the State
Treasury. With a larger appropriation, corresponding with the larger
expenditures in freight and numerous other items at Seattle as compared
to Portland, the effort for an improved display would not have been
difficult; but with the appropriation practically the same, considering
the salvage benefit realized for Portland from California's exhibit
the previous year at St. Louis, the planning, the economizing, the
denials and the extra personal labor imposed in order to accomplish
the desired result can never be fully appreciated, except by those
who had immediate charge of the work. Those efforts were made the
more difficult by reason of California's reputation for open handed
hospitality, and the ever present consciousness that nothing must
be done or left undone that might tend to impair that reputation.
You can understand it is no easy task to maintain a show of generous
hospitality all day, and then set up at night to figure out how you can
do the same thing to-morrow without unduly impairing a limited revenue.