Seattle's First World's Fair - from KING 5

Seattle's KING 5 television has a segment about the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition on their Evening Magazine:

http://www.king5.com/video/eveningmagazine-index.html?nvid=345269

It's a great synopsis of a little-known exposition that has since become overshadowed by the 1962 Century 21 Exposition.

With plans to celebrate the centennial, I suspect we'll be hearing a lot more about the A-Y-E in the months to come.

Wall Street Journal Article: the United States and World's Fairs Today

The Wall Street Journal today published an article on page one entitled The U.S. Can't Host a World Expo, and Fans Say That's No Fair. The author talked to me about many of these issues and I'm even mentioned in the article. ExpoMuseum was used as a source for some of the interactive graphics.

It's great that these issues are getting this level of attention. However, there are many different issues related to world's fairs here and for a lay audience, it's easy to get them confused.

Issue 1: The United States Pavilion at Expo 2010
I've spoken of this before and I have some hope that there will be a U.S. National Pavilion in Shanghai. We're way behind schedule on this with some pavilions already under construction. I'm hoping a way will be found to fully fund the pavilion soon. It would be a great embarrassment for my country to be unrepresented among nearly 200 other countries. I've written about this issue before. In the interest of full disclosure, I am an unpaid member of the BH&L Group's advisory board.

Issue 2: United States Membership in the Bureau International des Expositions (BIE)
I'm glad to see this issue mentioned in the press so soon after the end of the Bush Administration. I'm hoping, years from now, our lapse in membership will be seen as an historical blip. It's a lot easier to unjoin than join, however. My understanding is that it will mean a new treaty. I created the web site USA-BIE.org to spotlight this issue.

Issue 3: A United States City Hosting a World's Fair
It's been unclear to me for a few years now whether a United States city can host an international exposition without the United States being a member of the BIE. I think, technically, it can, but it would certainly make it more difficult for a bidding city to win. One issue that wasn't brought up was that of a North American city bidding (and winning) the right to host an expo. Queretaro, Mexico bid for Expo 2010 and it seems likely that a Canadian city will bid for Expo 2017. I think a Canadian or Mexican world's fair would certainly stoke interest in the United States.

I see San Francisco as being particularly well suited to hosting a world's fair in the coming years. To that end, I created 2020WorldsFair.com to stoke interest and start a conversation. The article might give the impression that I've received little interest in a world's fair here, but to be completely honest, bidding for 2020 wouldn't begin until around 2011 at the earliest. Politics can change very quickly in this town and it's unclear who the political and economic players will be in the next 2, 5, or 11 years.

Reading some of the comments to this article, as well as comments I've read elsewhere, it seems clear to me that most of the United States audience that does know about world's fairs, sees them as mostly through the lens of nostalgia. A world's fair in our own times would be totally unlike one from the '60's... which were different from the '30's... which were different from the 19th Century.

Many things have changed in the last few decades. The Olympics, museums, theme parks, and live entertainment have all changed with the times and are all seen as just as relevant today as they were years ago. International expositions, as a medium, combine these and more. Arguments that we don't "need" world's fairs now that we have the internet and jet travel just don't stand up to scrutiny when you look at other mediums such as these. If people no longer liked to experience things in person, we would have seen a decline in museum visits, theme park visit, or live entertainment attendance in the last few decades.

70th Anniversary of the Golden Gate International Exposition

In 1939 and 1940, the years most known for New York's world's fair, San Francisco also hosted a large exposition on Treasure Island in the San Francisco Bay. It was San Francisco's third and last (so far) international exposition.

Today's San Francisco Chronicle has an article today about the exposition with some photos:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/02/17/BAB415T0KF.DTL

This Saturday, the Treasure Island Museum Association is hosting a Treasure Island History Day from 11 a.m. to 3 a.m., complete with walking tours, slide and video shows, and memorabilia:
TreasureIslandMuseum.org

1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition Photos

Tuesday's San Francisco Chronicle featured a wonderful gallery of 22 photos from the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/27/BAQ815E1HG.DTL

Getting Obama's Attention about Expo 2010

The office of the president-elect's site, Change.gov, has a feature called the Citizen's Briefing Book.

In it, Bob Jacobson at the BH&L Group has posted about the issue of the United States Pavilion at Expo 2010. I've put in my two cents as well (and giving the issue a "vote up."

I encourage anyone else interested in the issue to visit the issue's page:
http://citizensbriefingbook.change.gov/ideas/viewIdea.apexp?id=087800000004mIL

Remembering New Orleans 1984

As we celebrate the 25th anniversary of the 1984 Louisiana World's Fair, I encourage those who remember well those 6 months in 1984 by helping to rebuild the city through Rebuilding Together New Orleans. The goal is to donate $8400 to the organization.

Expo 58 United States Pavilion: What's My Line

In the last year, I've become a big fan of the Game Show Network's reruns of the classic panel game show What's My Line. They've been running episodes in order and they're currently showing episodes from 1958.

The host, journalist John Charles Daly, left for two weeks to travel to Europe and mentioned to the audience he was going to see "the fair in Brussels." I thought it was interesting that he didn't feel the need to elaborate what was going on there, despite this being an era when very few Americans had the means to travel abroad.

Weeks later, when bandleader Benny Goodman visited the show, he was asked about his visit to Expo 58 and what he thought about the United States Pavilion and its exhibits. He was generally favorable about the music venue but attempted to be diplomatic in the face of some criticism about the exhibit. Panelist Dorothy Kilgallen, also a columnist who'd visited Expo 58, expressed high praise for the exhibit.

I think there are a couple of interesting things about these exchanges. I'd like to hear more about what sorts of criticism was being leveled at the design of the United States Pavilion in 1958. I also find it interesting that this was considered a large enough issue to take two or three minutes away from a game show to discuss.

I think it's instructive that the quality of the United States Pavilion was seen as an important issue, one that affects other nations' perceptions of the country.

Fifty-one years later, it has become questionable whether the United States will even have a presence at next year's world's fair, the largest in history and China's first.

25th Anniversary of the Louisiana World Exposition

This year marks the 25th anniversary of the 1984 Louisiana World's Fair, the last world's fair held in the United States.

I'm researching possible commemorations of the event in New Orleans this year, but in addition to any actual events, I'm working on some ideas for a retrospective web site that both marks the anniversary and afford people the opportunity to help New Orleans, which is still struggling with the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

To that end, I'm soliciting ideas for groups I can partner with using the web sites 1984WorldsFair.com and 84plus25.org.

Know of any appropriate charities? Please let me know. Ideally, a connection to the world's fair would make the effort "click" and achieve the most attention.

Season Pass Podcast Year in Review... and a Couple of Corrections

This week, I was a guest on The Season Pass Podcast for the third time. It was posted today and listening to it, I already found a couple of misstatements on my part:

Expo 2008 Zaragoza attendance:
I said that Expo 2008's final attendance figure was about 5.9 million, just shy of the 6 million they'd projected. I'm still researching the exact final attendance figures, but the attendance was closer to 5.5 million, still not too shabby for a 3-month exposition.

Barry Howard's United States Pavilion Experience:
I was right about his being involved in Expo 74 in Spokane and the 1984 Louisiana World Exposition, but his other United States Pavilion was Expo 70 in Osaka, Japan.

Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition Centennial

2009 marks the 100th anniversary of Seattle's Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition and plans are already afoot for the new year.

There are two sites info about 2009's plans:
http://www.AYP100.org/ and http://www.AYPE.org/

Expo 2010 United States Pavilion Press Release

"US Must Act Rapidly to Ensure Participation in China's 2010 World Expo or Risk Major Diplomatic Blunder, Says Consortium"

That's the headline of a press release today from the BH&L Group, of which I'm a member of its advisory board. We're hoping to save the troubled efforts to create a United States Pavilion at Shanghai's Expo 2010, China's first world's fair.

To that end, I created the website UnitedStatesPavilion.com. I'm hoping this might finally get the ball rolling.

The press release can be found at: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2008/12/prweb1702724.htm.

Sad News about the Expo 2010 United States Pavilion

I've received word tonight that the group that the State Department had chosen to fund, plan, design, build, and staff a United States Pavilion at Expo 2010, has announced that they've run out of both time and money.

Expo 2010 opens in May 2010 and it was estimated that the cost of a US Pavilion would have been about 100 million dollars. Under current government rules, all of that money would have had to have come from private industry.

It now looks like there will be no United States Pavilion at history's largest world's fair, a world's fair in perhaps the most important country of the 21st country, an exposition that will host over 200 other countries and 70 to 100 million visitors.

We need to change United States policy toward international expositions. Not only do we need to be able to fund pavilions for government monies, we need to rejoin the Bureau International des Expositions, an organization that now boasts over 100 member nations.

Nicholas Kristof Article in New York Times

An interesting article by Nicholas Kristof appeared in today's New York Times. Entitled "Rebranding the U.S. with Obama," he talks about how public opinion of the United States will undergo a big change if Barack Obama is elected president of the United States. It includes this fascinating interchange between Mr. Kristof and a Chinese friend about Barack Obama's likely win:

She: Obama? But he’s the black man, isn’t he?

Me: Yes, exactly.

She: But surely a black man couldn’t become president of the United States?

Me: It looks as if he’ll be elected.

She: But president? That’s such an important job! In America, I thought blacks were janitors and laborers.

Me: No, blacks have all kinds of jobs.

She: What do white people think about that, about getting a black president? Are they upset? Are they angry?

Me: No, of course not! If Obama is elected, it’ll be because white people voted for him.

[Long pause.]

She: Really? Unbelievable! What an amazing country!

Setting aside the political aspect of the article, I think it serves to illustrate how people's attitudes about a country can be changed with simple information.

Imagine the potential of a United States Pavilion at Expo 2010 in Shanghai. There's so much opportunity there, not just economically but also diplomatically. I would love to be working in the United States Pavilion and overhear Chinese people leaving the pavilion saying "What an amazing country!"

Now, imagine that there's no United States Pavilion because the funds couldn't be found. Expo 2010 will host over 200 countries for six months in Shanghai. They're expecting 70 to 100 million visitors. What will the Chinese people think if the richest and most powerful country in the world couldn't find the money to participate in China's first world's fair.

NBA and AEG at Expo 2010

From the Los Angeles Times today:

SHANGHAI -- The NBA and the Los Angeles sports and entertainment firm AEG announced plans Tuesday to help develop a $280-million arena and recreation center for the Shanghai World Expo in 2010 -- the first of a dozen multipurpose arenas that the new joint venture hopes to build in China.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-china15-2008oct15,0,7372063.story?track=rss

Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any new news about plans for a United States Pavilion at the site.

Tent of Tomorrow

Whenever I go to New York, I make a pilgrimage to Flushing Meadows, the site of both the 1939-'40 and 1964-'65 New York World's Fair. I try to imagine what it would have been like to have attended those expositions. The New York State Pavilion from the '64-'65 expo, even then, was in sad state of affairs. Earlier this year, they ripped out the exterior elevators to the observation saucers for fear that they would fall off.

As posted in the Queens Chronicle:

In an about-face, the city is now seeking state landmarking for the decaying 44-year-old New York State Pavilion in Flushing Meadows Park.

Although it was the city that abetted the pavilion’s neglect, Parks Department officials now say they are encouraging state landmarking — which would lead to federal status — to secure funding to restore the structure built for the 1964-65 World’s Fair.

Officials say a National Register of Historic Places listing would make the city eligible for money to shore up and restore the site.

Expo 2008, Aragon Pavilion

I've posted before about the wonderful Aragon Pavilion at Expo 2008, but this past week, I discovered that the pavilion's movie, Simfonía de Aragón, had posted online.

To put the film in context, it was shown on multiple screens in a huge room that took up an entire level of the pavilion. large glossy black irregular shapes, which served as support for the pavilion divided up the interior space, which was further articulated by little streams bordered by rocks. Visitors explored the space and navigated over the stream using small bridges and discovered a few hidden artifacts in recesses in the columns. In addition to the film that dominated the space, interactive projections also provided diversions on the floor.

Here are three photos of the Aragon Paviion I took while there:









Here is the film in two parts:

Expo 2008, Closing Day

Sadly, I was not at Expo 2008 for closing day. But, by all reports, it was pretty amazing. Thankfully, we live in the age of YouTube. A kind soul posted the closing ceremonies performance by Philip Glass (incidentally, my favorite composer), who also performed at Seville's Expo '92.

Expo 2008, being a relatively small world's fair, and Zaragoza, being a relatively small city, made for an amazing atmosphere. I can't recall a city being and an expo being so integrated into each other. The Expo seemed to start way outside the gates. The videos from the closing ceremonies show that. The fireworks running up and down the Ebro River connected the Expo site to the historic center of town. Like many visitors to Expo, my hotel was there, so I had the pleasure of walking to and from the world's fair site alongside the river.

Apparently, Expo 2008 had 5.65 million visitors, just shy of their projected 6 million. Interestingly, they overbuilt their parking facilities. They were mostly empty when I visited in June and apparently went mostly unused with 40.1% taking buses to the site and an amazing 18.5% traveling by foot! It's a wonderfully walkable city and I hope to visit someday in the future and see how the expo site is woven into the fabric of the city.

Here's Aragon TV's coverage (in 5 parts), including a great round-up video at the end:

Edmonton Sun: 2017 World's Fair 'Doable' for Edmonton

In today's Edmonton Sun:

Bringing the world's fair to the Alberta capital in 2017 is "doable," say officials laying the groundwork for Edmonton's bid.

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2008/09/12/6744116-sun.html

I've said it before, but I'll say it again: I would be very happy to finally see a world's fair in North America again. If 2017 is the year, it will end a 31 year gap in North American world's fairs. The last expo was Expo '86 in Vancouver.

Expo 2008 Attendance Numbers

I still haven't found a cumulative number for Expo 2008's attendance yet, but the BIE is reporting that the average attendance at Expo 2008 as of 09 September is 57,909. Not surprisingly, yesterday's attendance was higher than that: 89,441.

http://www.bie-paris.org/main/popup.php?a=620

I say it isn't surprising since we're in the last week. When I went to Expo 2005, I was there the last ten days and I can attest that there's always a huge surge of visitors during the last few days. People have unused tickets and many locals want to see the Expo before it closes. After all, there's no second season.

So, since yesterday was the 88th of the 93 days, we can assume they've had about 5,095,992 visitors (88 x 57,909). If we assume the next five days will also have high attendance (and I think we could argue the last two days, a weekend, will be even higher), that would add at least 447,205 more visitors (5 x 89,441) to make the total 5,543,197.

Before Expo 2008 started, they predicted 6,000,000 visitors. To meet that, they'd need 904,008 visitors in the next five days, an average of 180,801 per day.

Visiting the Season Pass Podcast

This week I had the great pleasure to visit the folks at the Season Pass Podcast and talk world's fairs. It's now available to listen to at:
http://seasonpasspodcast.libsyn.com/index.php?post_id=374642

We also talked a bit about Atlanta's World of Sid and Marty Krofft amusement park that lasted just one season in 1976.