How were things going? Don't ask. He has a maddening punch list, headed by an exasperating hunt for odd, offset hinges he needs to hang a door for handicapped access.
The steep-gabled, stone Victorian is one of the last remnants of the 1876 U.S. Centennial that occupied 285 acres here near what is now the Mann Music Center: The other is Memorial Hall, being renovated to house the Please Touch Museum.
Once upon a time at the corner of Belmont where Montgomery Drive cuts downhill toward the Schuylkill Expressway, it was one of a parade of centennial houses showcasing the states (thus the road behind it called States Drive); part of one of the most extraordinary events to grace the 100-year-old nation.
It was a moment in the sun, as well, for Philadelphia, cementing it as a global powerhouse - of manufacturing, tourism, and commercial vitality.
Close to 10 million visitors (out of a U.S. population of 40-some million) flocked to the park during the six-month run, taking in 30,000 exhibits and (for better or for worse) paving the way, in the view of Hagley Museum world's fair historian Theresa Snyder, for our contemporary consumer culture.
An illustration of the exposition's hubbub blown up in a mural behind the cafe coffee bar telegraphs the excitement and exotica - turbans and Asian garb, kiosks and gawking crowds.
Shoo-fly pie - associated now with Lancaster County - was launched at the fair as "Centennial Cake." Sweetened popcorn balls made a debut. Heinz ketchup, too. For some, it provided a first encounter with a tropical visitor - the banana.
There was no shortage of price- gouging, with the French restaurant, but of course, a prime offender. And little false modesty: An advertising card for the American Air [Butter] Churn proclaimed it "The Greatest Labor-Saving Machine Ever Invented."
