re, many of the buildings in the exposition were of an experimental nature. This was true even of Richard Morris Hunt's Beaux Arts influenced domed structure at the end of the Court of Honor. Although generally known as a classicist, Hunt created this building with "a notably audacious combination of forms and details from different sources" (Whiffen and Koeper, 1969, p. 274).
American architects in the late nineteenth century were also influenced by the economic and social changes which were taking place at the time. In the years following the American Civil War, the country began to shift from a rural economy to an industrial one. As a result of this shift, many American cities experienced dramatic population growth. This urbanization was also influenced by the development of new technologies. Thus, for example, "electrification of streetcar lines in the 1880s, and the manufacture of inexpensive motor vehicles some three decades later, encouraged low density, small scale growth, most of which occurred piecemeal, and was guided by little or no planning
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