The Controversial History of the 1964 New York World's Fair

this video was not meant to be about the 1964 New York World's Fair when I started it this was merely a stop off point on a different video to provide some necessary context but as I was working on that script I found myself looking more into this event and discovered this is not the 1964 New York World's Fair I thought I knew I hear long with many others always knew this as Disney's World's Fair an opportunity for web enterprises to showcase their ability and perfect their audio animatronics and groundbreaking ride systems and because of that I just associated it to the quality and magic that most people already associate Disney with Walt and his team were so invested in the event that I couldn't really see it as being a failure let alone controversial though that was completely wrong firstly it wasn't even a World's Fair it just used the name it was officially dissing dorste by the Bureau of international exhibitions the ones who organized the actual World's Fairs it was plagued with controversy mismanagement and financial concerns this is the story of the 1964 New York World's Fair [Music] in 1851 the Crystal Palace in Hyde Park London stood as an immense glass and iron structure built to house the Great Exhibition it was an idea sparked by Prince Albert husband of Queen Victoria and showcased the best of culture and technology from around the world the Crystal Palace which is unfortunately now in ruins was a marvel for the time it was 990 thousand square feet and housed the first major installation of plush in public toilets with six million people attended the exhibition the event would prove a major success and it garnered international attention almost instantly spawn in multiple competitors in New York Paris Indiana it was the first of what is now known as a World's Fair an opportunity for countries to come together and showcase what they have to offer the world and they still continue to this very day as these international exhibitions started to gain popularity it was necessary to have a governing board to regulate the events in 1928 the Bureau of international exhibitions was created and rules were drafted to define the duration frequency size and construction attributes of each International Exhibition today 170 countries are members of this Bureau the exhibition's continued to grow in popularity they were a way to connect the world before easily accesible sky travel communications and the Internet the 1964 New York World's Fair is largely remembered for Disney's involvement in the Exposition we´d enterprises designed and created for attractions that would be featured at the fair and many Disney history documentaries reflect on it being a major success for the Disney Company but they weren't involved from the beginning and came aboard and made a lot of controversy that the fair had caused the fair was conceived out of nostalgia a group of New York businessmen reminisced on their childhood experience with the 1939 New York World's Fair and wanted to try their hand at a modern fair which they hoped would result in an economic boom within the city due to the rise in tourism they assembled the World's Fair Corporation and immediately to work the organizers of the event needed somebody with influence power and prestige to head their cooperation and turn to Robert Moses Moses was considered New York's master builder and was responsible for much of New York City's highway infrastructure and public parks Moses was a man of influence even persuading the United Nations to build their headquarters in New York over Philadelphia and had a history of sourcing funds for his projects with relative ease with feasibility studies reporting that the fair would be immensely expensive Moses was the right person to source the necessary income Moses also had a personal stake in the project in the mid 1930s he had overseen turning a vast area of Queens into reclaimed land temporarily for the 1939 World's Fair and then permanently as the Flushing Meadows Park this was Moses's most ambitious and grand park project to date but when the 1939 fair ended as a financial failure the funds just weren't available to continue the park Moses hoped to continue his plan with the 1964 World's Fair for both Moses's project and the fair to be profitable 70 million people would need to visit the exposition but for attendance that high the event would need to be held for two years private financing and the sales of bonds was necessary to stage the fair and all exhibitors who wish to construct pavilions would be charged a site rental fee this directly conflicted with the Bureau of international exhibitions rules which state that an event such as this can only run for six months and must not charge exhibitors any grand the rules also only allowed one exposition in each country every ten years and the Seattle World's Fair was already sanctioned for 1962 to guarantee that the 40 member nations of the Bureau would participate in the event the fair organizers understood that an official sanction would be required Moses personally traveled to the BIE headquarters in Paris to reach an agreement for official approval with the bureau they weren't budget and they denied New York's bid Moses was outraged and immediately took his anger to the press publicly stating his disdain for the bureau and their bureaucracy in retaliation the BIE formally requested that each of their member nations not to participate in the New York Fair which edged on being a disaster for the event Canada Australia most major European nations the Soviet Union and to all BIA members refused to attend and set out to tarnish the image of the fam with many countries outright denounced in the exposition the fair organizers turned to nations with smaller economies as well as private companies to help bolster the fares line up these nations included but weren't limited to Vatican City Mexico Island and Pakistan Disney's involvement in the fair came about due to this rejection even with the smaller nations the fair organization needed to turn to trade and tourism companies to host pavilions to provide further incentives for guests to visit and Disney being a household name and amusements within America was a perfect choice April 22nd 1964 the New York World's Fair was opened to the public the fair was dedicated to man's achievement on a shrinking globe in an expanding of us the fair would run until October where it would close temporarily and then open for the 1965 season on April 21st it was an enormous event and spanned 646 acres for comparison the Magic Kingdom of Walt Disney World one of their biggest parks spans only 106 acres it had 140 pavilions with 80 countries represented businesses featured included IBM 7r General Motors Pepsi and of course dizzy the fair is recognized for being the venue in which Walt Disney perfected his system for the audio-animatronics they featured in four attractions at the fair many of which have gone on to become staple attractions within the Disney theme parks lineup the first was Pepsi Cola presents Walt Disney's it's a small world as - Luke - UNICEF and the world's children at the Pepsi Cola pavilion this was the first home of the now infamous Disney attraction which has gone on to feature in every single Disney Resort except Shanghai General Electric sponsored Progress land which was the original version of the Carousel of Progress attraction which currently shows in Tomorrowland at the Magic Kingdom it was an audio-animatronic presentation showcasing the progress of electricity within the home Ford Motor Company presented Ford's Magic Skyway which was a wet Imagineering designed pavilion between 50 motorless Ford convertibles fairgoers would be seated in these vehicles and transported through scenes with audio-animatronic dinosaurs and cavemen to showcase the era in which gave us modern oil the last attraction of Disney's was featured within the illinois's pavilion it was a lifelike President Abraham Lincoln audio-animatronic which recited famous speeches from his time named great moments with mr. Lincoln well it's not necessarily an attraction we´d also created a 120 foot high terror of the four winds designed by famous imaginary Raleigh which was located outside the it's a small world pavilion Disney also had their costume characters roaming the fairgrounds and interacting with guests as an additional display of what Disney had to offer outside of Disney there were multiple other notable pavilions but at 140 of them it had been difficult to explore them all so here are a few of the standout nasa-sponsored a two-acre United States space park which exhibited full-scale models of various parts of their rockets which included 5f1 engines used in the first stage of a Saturn 5 rocket Wisconsin exhibited the world's largest cheese and Florida brought in dolphin show flamingos and a talented cockatoo from Miami Louisiana had a pavilion called Bourbon Street which was inspired by New Orleans French Quarter but it went bankrupt before the event started who was then bought and operated by a private company for the duration of the Faire Belgium recreated an entire Belgian village as a walkthrough and it was a fair favorite the Vatican exhibited Michelangelo's pietà which was bought from Saint Peter's Basilica with the permission of pope john xxiii Indonesia initially had a pavilion at the fair but in 1964 relations between the country and western world deteriorated they withdrew from the United Nations in January of 1965 and from the fair in March the fair cooperation then seized the pavilion and it remained closed for the 1965 season outside of the exhibits there weren't many traditional or news right the organizers of the fair were opposed to having a Midway a location of carnival games amusement rides entertainment and field shows on the principle that it would generate a honky-tonk atmosphere which was against the ideals of the exposition instead they had an area dedicated to amusements on the shore of Meadow Lake down south of the main exhibition area but for many these amusements were considered rather dull Midway's were a staple of many other international exhibitions and its exclusion caused many to pass on the Faire entirely this amusement area was supposed to remain open for hours past the exhibits closing at 10:00 p.m. however most fair goers would merely wait until the 9:00 p.m. fountain and fireworks display at the pool of industry which was presented every night then they would promptly depart leaving the fairgrounds mostly empty around midnight considering that Disney already had a lot of attractions at the exposition there weren't discussions of leaving them there and expanding on the area to create an East Coast Disneyland Walt already wanted a park on that side of the country and it did seem very convenient but they decided to hold off until the fair had finished to continue their discussions the 1964 New York World's Fair concluded after its second season and saw 51 and a half million people through its gates whilst an impressive number it was far less than the expected 70 million to turn a profit unfortunately the fair seemed to underperform in a lot of areas for many of those involved in the organizers the closure didn't end the controversy though the fair cooperation had taken in millions for advance ticket sales for both the 1964 and 1965 seasons though the receipts of the sales were only booked against the first season this made it appear as if the fair had a surplus of operating cash when in reality it was borrowing from the second season to pay the bills spent an increase through the first season despite lower attendance than what was expected and by the end of this season Moses and his team lacked the money to pay the bill and teat it on bankruptcy despite these problems the fair still carried on into its second season but returns for investors and those with bonds were far less favorable returning only nineteen point two cents on the dollar the fairs big spectacles including one to world at the Meadow Lake amphitheater to Broadway with love in the Texas pavilion and dick buttons ice Stravaganza in the new york city per billion all closed ahead of schedule with heavy losses Disney was perhaps the luckiest out of many of those involved at the end of the World's Fair they had new exciting technology that would pave the way for some of Disney's greatest attractions they also didn't have a financial stake in the fair as many attractions were either sponsored or built on behalf of another company it's a small world Carousel of Progress and the Lincoln audio-animatronic from great moments with mr. Lincoln were all transferred to their Disneyland park in Anaheim the wet way ride system that was used for the Fords Mantic Skyway would be improved upon and utilized in the Tomorrowland people mover attraction Disney continued the discussion of an East Coast Disneyland but decided on Florida over New York and expanded upon the idea to become the Walt Disney World Resort their involvement with the World's Fair would also influence the construction of Epcot which is considered a permanent World's Fair Robert Moses was not spared of criticism after the event in 1974 a biography was released by Robert Carew which outlined the creation and use of power in local and state politics and focused on Moses's use of unelected positions to design and implement his projects often at great cost to communities it reflected on how Moses strive for power and that he was relentless on his pursuit racist tendencies were also exposed Moses and his supporters considered the book biased against him and Moses released the 23 page statement defending himself but it did little to help the situation Moses passed away in 1981 at 91 years of age amid a tarnished image damaged reputation modern criticism seemed to be more in Moses's favor claiming that American public institutions often had the inability to maintain and construct infrastructure projects something that Moses did with ease today you can still see many remnants of the 1964 New York World's Fair in the Flushing Meadows Park in Queens the park has near the exact same layout is the fair did in the 60s and there are still a couple pavilions either being used for different purposes or derelict memories of the past the Unisphere the center point of the fair still stands to this very day as a reminder of the event many years ago considering that the park still exists to this day with many amenities for locals perhaps Moses finally achieved his goal it can't be argued that the 1964 New York World's Fair wasn't incredible it had an enormous scope and in terms of a World Fair it delivered but I believe that many just assumed that because Disney saw success from the event that it was overall successful unfortunately that was not the case for everybody and for many it tore apart finances and reputation the BIE continued to hold their worlds fairs and would eventually arrive at Expo 88 in Brisbane Australia this officially sanctioned exposition was dedicated to leisure in the age of technology and would be a half billion dollar event dedicated to themed entertainment and museum parks and more but that's a story for another day for review time I'm Dominic thanks for watching liking and subscribing [Music]

Channel: ReviewTyme

Views: 142,771

Keywords: reviewtyme, review, tyme, time, reviewtime, 1964 worlds fair, new york worlds fair, worlds fair, disney, disneyland, disney worlds fair, walt disney, walt disney worlds fair, carousel of progress, 1964 New York World's Fair, it's a small world, the peoplemover, disney history, disneyland history, disney parks history, documentary, new york city, great moments with mr lincoln, lincoln disney, unisphere, robert moses

Id: Hm3k5sQSbTY

Length: 16min 53sec (1013 seconds)

Published: Fri Jun 07 2019