1939 World's Fair

It's not very common that I find eye-witness testimony about the material I write about.  Writing about events that took place decades or centuries a good offers an interesting glimpse into the past, but few are still around to tell about it.

This past weekend at my brother's wedding, I met an 88-year-old woman who told me she visited New York City once, 74 years ago.  The year was 1939 and she took a Greyhound bus from South Carolina to New York City to visit the 1939 World's Fair.  What was this event that was apparently compelling enough for her to endure a 3 day bus ride?

Souvenir Booklet of 1939 World's Fair

Stamp showing the "Perisphere"

People Entering the Perisphere

 The 1939 World's Fair took place on the current site of the Met's Stadium in Queens.  Over 44 million people attended the event.  At the center of the grounds was the "Perisphere" a dome-shaped construction which become symbolic of the 1939 World's Fair.  The 180 foot diameter dome featured "Democracity," a model city of the future, which was viewed from a moving escalator.

The 1200+ acre grounds for the event were divided into zones, including a Transportation zone, Communications and Business Zone, Food Zone, and Government Zone, with a focus on the future. 
The Transportation zone, for example, featured new automobiles from GM and Chrysler which could be viewed in a room cooled by air-conditioning, a novelty at the time.  The purpose of the event was to uplift the human spirit following the Great Depression of the 1930s and to strive to bring global harmonization to a world on the brink of warfare.

Grounds of the 1939 World's Fair