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Blog posts by Marc Selvaggio

Marc Selvaggio deals in Printed Ephemera, Manuscripts, Unusual Books, Photographs, and Archives from a variety of disciplines.

To mark the 75th Anniversary of 1939, we've asked some ABAA members to discuss publications from that momentous year. Marc Selvaggio, whose specialties include World's Fairs and International Expositions, takes us down memory lane as he examines the publications of the 1939 World's Fairs held in New York and San Francisco. On September 23rd, 1938, a group of men in dark suits gathered around a construction site in Queens and watched as a 90-inch, 800-pound cylinder, made of the special new alloy called “Cupaloy,” was lowered down a 500-foot tube. The solemn ceremony involved in the placement of this cylinder—officially known as the Westinghouse Time Capsule– inaugurated the site for the New York World's Fair. The Fair itself opened to an enthusiastic public on April 30, 1939. Meanwhile independent of the planning frenzy in New Yor... [more 1939: Before The War, The Fairs]