Author: GELERNTER, DAVID
Title: 1939: The Lost World of the Fair
Description: New York: The Free Press, 1995. 0028740025. First Printing. Hard Cover. ISBN: 0028740025. Publisher's quarter white cloth over blue boards, gilt lettering on spine, top edge blue, endpapers illustrated with maps, fore-edge deckle. The 1939-40 New York World's Fair was built on a garbage dump in Flushing, Queens. Through the eyes of fictitious characters, we see the exhibits: AT&T, Ford, General Motors, DuPont, Futurama and Democracity. We review the fair's many firsts: the introduction of regular TV broadcasting, FM radio, fluorescent lighting and the fax machine. The computer, which existed in a rudimentary form, wasn't even mentioned. We are introduced to the society of the day: everyone loved big-band music, men always seemed to wear neckties and all feared the European war that had just begun. Also at the fair, "pornography was a mainstay"; the fair perhaps even invented the peep show. The author convincingly argues that the Americans of 1939 were more sophisticated than Americans are today: they were readers, and their educational systems were superior. Three names crop up repeatedly: President Franklin Roosevelt, inventor of the New Deal, which fueled the money that made New York City what it is; Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, the no-nonsense turbo known as the Little Flower; and builder Robert Moses, the man with the edifice complex that made, and some say destroyed, modern New York City. Return to a time when lunch at the Automat was 15 cents, the streets were safe, and remember one thing: the fair went bankrupt. Gelernter (The Muse in the Machine) has given us a portrait of yesteryear that is to be cherished. (Publishers Weekly). Top edge slightly scratched, previous owner's annotations in black pen on ffep, blue marks on ffep, else tight, square, unmarked, and clean. VERY GOOD-/VERY GOOD . Photographs. 8vo 8" - 9" tall. 418 pp. Very Good- in Very Good dust jacket .
Keywords: 0028740025 World's Fair Adolf Hitler World War II World War I New York Chicago Great Depression F.D. R. Illustrated Books History
See more books from our catalog: History
Title: 1939: The Lost World of the Fair
Description: New York: The Free Press, 1995. 0028740025. First Printing. Hard Cover. ISBN: 0028740025. Publisher's quarter white cloth over blue boards, gilt lettering on spine, top edge blue, endpapers illustrated with maps, fore-edge deckle. The 1939-40 New York World's Fair was built on a garbage dump in Flushing, Queens. Through the eyes of fictitious characters, we see the exhibits: AT&T, Ford, General Motors, DuPont, Futurama and Democracity. We review the fair's many firsts: the introduction of regular TV broadcasting, FM radio, fluorescent lighting and the fax machine. The computer, which existed in a rudimentary form, wasn't even mentioned. We are introduced to the society of the day: everyone loved big-band music, men always seemed to wear neckties and all feared the European war that had just begun. Also at the fair, "pornography was a mainstay"; the fair perhaps even invented the peep show. The author convincingly argues that the Americans of 1939 were more sophisticated than Americans are today: they were readers, and their educational systems were superior. Three names crop up repeatedly: President Franklin Roosevelt, inventor of the New Deal, which fueled the money that made New York City what it is; Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia, the no-nonsense turbo known as the Little Flower; and builder Robert Moses, the man with the edifice complex that made, and some say destroyed, modern New York City. Return to a time when lunch at the Automat was 15 cents, the streets were safe, and remember one thing: the fair went bankrupt. Gelernter (The Muse in the Machine) has given us a portrait of yesteryear that is to be cherished. (Publishers Weekly). Top edge slightly scratched, previous owner's annotations in black pen on ffep, blue marks on ffep, else tight, square, unmarked, and clean. VERY GOOD-/VERY GOOD . Photographs. 8vo 8" - 9" tall. 418 pp. Very Good- in Very Good dust jacket .
Keywords: 0028740025 World's Fair Adolf Hitler World War II World War I New York Chicago Great Depression F.D. R. Illustrated Books History
Price: US$ 25.00 Seller: Round Table Books, LLC
- Book number: 22985
- Book number: 22985
See more books from our catalog: History