Facing Yellowstone Park across the street at the Zone's upper end was the 'Mysterious Orient', listed in the Official Guide as the 'Oriental Village'. It was still far behind schedule two days before opening. In May it changed management and became the Streets of Cairo, with a Turkish theater, booths for coffee and cigarettes, camels and sword dancers. Its dancers rode in the Zone Day parade under what the program called 'The Liveliest Line of Languid Loveliness'.
Todd thought it well run, but it was a long walk from Fillmore Street. Many visitors turned back before they reached it or went straight on out the Van Ness gate. Under both managements it took in a little over $60,000, not enough to carry its large company.
At a glance
- Renamed the Streets of Cairo after a change of management in May 1915.
- Receipts a little over $60,000 under both managements.
- It faced Yellowstone Park across the street at the Van Ness end.
Afterward
Demolished with the Zone in 1916.
Where it stood
Mysterious Orient / Streets of Cairo stood at about 37.80268 N, 122.42542 W on today's map. The whole fairground over the city →
Sources
- Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. II (1921), ch. XLVII, p. 255
- Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. II (1921), ch. LXVI, pp. 365-366
- Frank Morton Todd, The Story of the Exposition, vol. III (1921), ch. IX, p. 63
- Official Guide of the Panama-Pacific International Exposition (1915), p. 69
- Map of the Zone concessions, spring 1915 (reproduced in 'Let Me Get There', USC Scalar), Spring 1915 map of the Zone concessions