Mar 23, 2020
In a world before the internet, World’s Fairs were the killer app of the 19th and most of the 20th centuries. Countries would assemble at a central place for about 6 months and build pavilions, each sharing their nation’s technology, culture, and national sources of pride, symbols, heroes, and achievements. If you’ve ever been to Epcot at Disney World, you get the idea. There were two World's Fairs in New York about 25 years apart. Much of the World’s fair architecture was forward-thinking and Modernist, but only a few buildings on the New York fairgrounds survive today, some of them barely. We welcome two superfans who’ve been working over ten years to restore what’s left, Mitch Silverstein and Stephanie Bohn, both featured in the documentary Modern Ruin, produced by past podcast guest Matt Silva, detailing the site’s post-fair use, deterioration, and growing advocacy efforts.