In a word, Gilded Age New York City and Chicago were... Different. In a slightly larger assembly of words, they were Rather Different But Still Big Cities In One Country That Have A Great Number Of Similarities.
In how they are different, well... For one thing, New York City was (and still is) old. Old buildings, old inhabitants, old history, old notoriety. It had a reputation, even then, of importance and opportunity and almost a sort of... Glamour. This was further advocated by all of the innovations and new, remarkable museums of art and history and science. The charm was concealing the chaos hidden within the social structure of the city. Immigrants were arriving by the boatload, especially after the construction of Ellis Island, and stirred up all sorts of prejudices and job scrambles and crime- oh so much crime- and sickness calls for reform and all around... Change of the face of New York to something multi-faceted and new. The city was changing, innovating, growing, getting bigger, gathering more power, and looked like it didn't have a competitor of any sort insofar as prominence on the American countenance.
Except for Chicago.
Although, to be fair, at this point in time they were sort of floundering over there in Illinois. The Great Chicago Fire had been devastating to all, but they were able to rise from the ashes due to the Gilded Age itself. Where New York entered the Gilded Age as a great city, the Gilded Age made Chicago great. Because of the hardships of the geography in Chicago, they had been forced to rethink many established engineering staples, to prevent the city from being affected so greatly by the unstable ground and the flooding. This brought genius engineers to light, and set it on a course for the World Fair. The World Fair itself would be what would save Chicago, and turn it into a great city once more.
-Mayor Mugwump (Jordan Whiteley)
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