Sunday, March 6, 2016
The 1939 New York World's Fair
I just picked up an envelope of photos of New York from 1939. It reminded me that I already had some photos from the 1939 New York World's Fair, so I've decided to put them up over the next few days. This one, found in the quarter box at the antique mall, shows the Trylon and Perisphere.
World's fairs are, essentially, massive trade shows, allowing countries and large corporations to sell themselves to the paying public. The 1939 fair was the first to be built around a theme, The World of Tomorrow. The Perisphere and Trylon were designed as the theme center. The buildings were by architects Wallace Harrison and J. Andre Fouilhoux. The Perisphere contained a massive diorama, Democracity a depiction of an ideal city of the future, by industrial designer Henry Dreyfuss.