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The 1939 New York World's Fair

1939 World's Fair

New York

Science Finds, Industry Applies, Man Conforms

April 30, 1939 ~ October 27, 1940

The Story, The Souvenirs

Motto: Science Finds, Industry Applies, Man Conforms

The 1939 New York World's Fair was one of the largest world's fairs of all time.  Many different countries around the world participated in it, and over 44 million people attended its exhibits in two seasons. The 1939 New York World's Fair allowed all visitors to take a look at "The world of tomorrow."

"The eyes of the Fair are on the future -- not in the sense of peering toward the unknown nor attempting to foretell the events of tomorrow and the shape of things to come, but in the sense of presenting a new and clearer view of today in preparation for tomorrow; a view of the forces and ideas that prevail as well as the machines.

To its visitors the Fair will say: "Here are the materials, ideas, and forces at work in our world. These are the tools with which the World of Tomorrow must be made. They are all interesting and much effort has been expended to lay them before you in an interesting way. Familiarity with today is the best preparation for the future." -- official New York World's Fair pamphlet.

Exhibits included a streamlined pencil sharpener, a futuristic car based city by G.M. and the first televisions. Television in the United States made its formal debut at the World's Fair in New York City on Sunday April 30, 1939 with the first Presidential address on Television by Franklin D. Roosevelt. The signal was sent by the  Telemobile (RCA's mobile Television van) to the Empire State transmitter and rebroadcast. The New York Times reported the broadcast was received in strategic locations and the pictures were clear and steady.

There was also a huge globe/planetarium located near the center of the fair.  Bell Labs "Voder", a keyboard-operated speech synthesizer, was demonstrated at the Fair.

The copy of the Magna Carta belonging to Lincoln Cathedral also left Britain in 1939 for the first time to be in the British Pavilion at the fair. Within months Britain joined World War II and it was deemed safer for it to remain in America until the end of hostilities. It therefore remained in Fort Knox, next to the original copy of the American constitution, until 1947.

The fair was also the occasion for the 1st World Science Fiction Convention, subsequently dubbed Nycon1.

The "Theme Center" consisted of two all-white, landmark monumental buildings named the Trylon (over 700 feet tall) and the Perisphere which one entered by moving stairway and exited via a grand curved walkway named the Helicline. Inside the Perisphere was a model city of tomorrow that visitors viewed from a moving walkway high above the floor level. The Theme Center was designed by the architect Wallace Harrison and his associate Max Abramovitz.

At night, with the latest in lighting technology switched on, the effect was felt by many visitors to be a "magical" experience.

At the IBM pavilion, electric typewriters, and a fantastic machine called the electric calculator that used punched cards, were on display.

At the Chrysler exhibit group, an audience in a theater with the new technology called "air conditioning" could watch a Plymouth being assembled right before their very eyes.

The Continental Baking exhibit, presenting a vast, continuous process of baking breads and other products. Consistent with the representative design sense of the Fair, this building was fashioned in the shape of a huge packaged bread loaf, white with red, yellow, and blue balloons on its curved facade. People today will recognize this as the packaging for Wonder Bread.

The great fair attracted over 45 million visitors and generated roughly $48 million in revenue. Since the Fair Corporation had invested 67 million dollars (in addition to nearly a hundred million dollars from other sources), it was an economic failure, and the corporation declared bankruptcy.

The Souvenirs

$85.50

Elektro is the nickname of a robot built by Westinghouse between 1937 and 1938. Seven feet tall, weighing 265 pounds, humanoid in appearance, it could walk by voice command, talk, smoke cigarettes, blow up balloons, and move its head and arms. The body consisted of a steel gear, cam and motor skeleton covered by an aluminum skin. The photoelectric "eyes" could distinguish red and green light. It was on exhibit at the 1939 New York World's Fair. It reappeared at that fair in 1940, with "Sparko", a robot dog that could bark, sit, and beg.  This is a scarce, gold tone, enameled pin of Elektro that was purchased at the fair at the Westinghouse exhibit, about one inch tall!

$62.50

$12.50

A 1939 New York World's Fair SyrocoWood Rectangular Thermometer. The Trylon & Perisphere appear at the bottom, the tubular thermometer is above the Perisphere. The SyrocoWood label is still on the back. The thermometer measures 1.25" wide x 3.75" long.

$75.50

$50.00