Day of Dreams

            Here we are just off the train at the site of the two New York World's Fairs -1939 and 1964. This is the first bit of the Dream Day. Sheldon has been fascinated by the Fairs since he was a nipper and so he could hardly contain himself when we got to Flushing Meadow in Queens.

Sheldon was so excited he bade me goodbye but I tackled him, calmed him down and we King Wenceslaused and Paged together.

The welcome pillar of the 1964 New York World's Fair. It had a two year run; from April 22 to October 18, 1964 and from April 21 to October 17, 1965 - a total of 360 days. It   featured 140 pavilions on 646 acres, the old site of the 1939-40 New York's World Fair. Althought the majority of the pavilions were United States commerical companies, there were also 21 state pavilions and 36 foreign pavilions. It was the dawn of the space age and the fair's theme was "Man in a Shrinking Globe in an Expanding Universe."

Back in '64 it might have looked more like this...

 A plaque in their memory

 There is nothing left of the 1939 event but the Unisphere from '64 is here in perpetuity.
Here is a first glimpse from a distance...

And  closer

and closer

til he has the whole world in his hands!

Two observation towers are left as well...as they were in '64...

and as we found them today

Lots of sculpture

The old New York Pavillion is now the New York Museum of Art and inside there are posters and cabinets full of memorabilia which would have cost peanuts to make and consume and are now worth thousands to collectors.

there was one set of these in the gift shop for almost $300.

One of the features of the 39 Fair was a walking around/above scale model of the 5 boroughs of New York. It is HUUUGE and takes up an entire room of the gallery. It has been updated a couple of times...the last in 96 which explains why the twin towers are still there

That little square is Union so we're about two blocks to the right. You can see our building but I am not going to tell you which one because I can't be bothered

  That is Washington Square with the arch looking up 5th Ave.

They even have a little view of Coney Island fun fair

You can see the magnitude of the model by the size of people viewing it from above.

There is a 'squisite collection of Tiffany lamps and windows and samples of glass. These are all circa 1910.

And here is a view of the scale model of the '39 Fair. I couldn't  find the Aussie pavilion. But there was one.

And so we bid farewell to the 1939 World's Fair!

We then subway'd to the recently refurbished Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, Queens.

The large foyer is stark white but with fantastic lighting. There is a great continuous cartoon on the entrance wall opposite the ticket counter

Sheldon insisted we have an "apple chokeyaterdeath" with our cuppa tea even though he knows I am trying to cut out sugar. 

This is the entrance to the main cinema and the curtain.

The 3D curtain resembled hundreds of Derwent coloured pencils poking out at us.

 They screened a silent film made in 1927 by John Ford called "Upstream", set in a theatrical boarding house. The only surviving copy was found in a shed in New Zealand last year and has been restored. A five piece ensemble provided the accompanying specially created score. It was very sweet and we laughed lots.

Above the main floor is a gallery of exhibits

A room of Hollywood glamour portraits from silents to golden age

Elsa Lanchester's "Bride of Frankenstein " wig

There were live masks of Brando,Pacino, Hoffman, Hurt and my favourite, Mr Walken.

Here are some fantastic cozzies

The middle one is Renee Zellweiger's finale coat from "Chicago" and the one on the right is Queen Latifah's Mama Morton gown from the same film.

They have built a tongue in cheek cinemette to screen children's movies and  cartoons. It is in homage to the picture palaces of the twenties and in particular to Grauman's Egyptian

And there are cases of product and fan mags

Guess who?.

My favourite was the scale model of the Roxy Cinema in New York which was built in 1926 for the premiere of a  Gloria Swanson film called "The Loves of Sunya"

And here are some renderings of the original cinema

And here is the amazing shot of Miss Swanson in the rubble of the partly demolished Roxy in 1960. Wheel coming full circle.

And now some final shots of the museum as were being kicked out at closing time. The bum's rush in melody, dear...

And tired but happy we bade farewell to Queens.