I was watching the History Channel and at the end of the program, they had a short newsreel-type feature titled Come to the Fair, which was about the 1964-65 New York World's Fair. It was interesting, but truth to tell, I'd have rather have seen something about the 1939 New York World's Fair which was held at the same site in Flushing Meadows a quarter-century earlier. I read a fascinating book about that fair by David Gelernter a few years ago, and it evoked nostalgia for a bygone age, one that was already threatened by the gathering storm clouds of war. The Germans boycotted both seasons of the fair, although all of the other major nations of the world had their own pavilions. It was all about the World of Tomorrow, but that new world rising was not the optimistic place they thought it would be.
You might like to take a photo tour of the 1939 New York World's Fair. Be sure to visit the iconic Trylon and Perisphere, if nothing else.
