0:00

World's Fairs, known

0:02

for being global, famous

0:04

for being old-timey. Nobody

0:07

thinks much about them today, so let's have

0:09

some fun. Let's find out why World's

0:11

Fairs are

0:14

secretly incredibly fascinating.

0:33

Hey there, folks. Welcome to

0:35

a whole new podcast episode, a podcast

0:37

all about why being alive is more interesting

0:40

than people think it is. My name is Alec

0:42

Schmidt, and I'm not alone because I'm joined by my co-host,

0:44

Katie Golden. Katie, hi. Hi.

0:46

Hello. Hi.

0:49

Thought you could get rid of me, didn't

0:53

you? Sudden new canon where I'm your

0:55

rival. Yeah, we'll just unspool it.

0:58

We'll figure it out. We're

1:01

both so glad to be joined by a very special guest

1:03

this week. He's the host of the wonderful podcast

1:05

Go Fact Yourself, right here on Maximum Fun,

1:08

the writer, comedian, host, and more, Jay

1:10

Keith Van Straten. Jay Keith, hello.

1:13

Hello, everybody. I am your rival, I've

1:15

decided. Wow. Right.

1:18

Fight, fight, fight. I needed a heel turn. I

1:23

can't have two rivals. It doesn't make narrative sense.

1:25

It just can't be. Oh, OK.

1:28

I have to confess, I recently had

1:31

to learn what heel turn was because I heard the expression

1:33

so often. I swear I thought it was something in

1:35

dance.

1:36

I thought it was a choreography

1:38

move, like kickball change, heel turn,

1:40

and left, like that kind of a thing. Heel, toe, heel,

1:43

toe. But it turns out it's something else.

1:45

Yeah. Yeah. So I will volunteer

1:47

to unheel turn. There's probably

1:49

a term for that also. Like I'm going to be a hero turn from

1:51

the heel,

1:52

and then the kickball change. I'm going to

1:54

do, yeah, a plie and a grand

1:56

jeté. Oh. Ho,

1:59

ho, ho. Well, there are wrestling

2:01

fans who are yelling at their podcast device

2:03

right now, and I apologize to

2:06

none of them. They

2:08

like being angry. It's food to

2:10

wrestling fans. Yeah, it will

2:12

be one stable. We'll fight them, another stable.

2:15

It's great. But,

2:18

folks, we have a wonderful topic this

2:21

week to explore with our special guest, Jake Heap.

2:24

And the topic is world's fairs. Thank

2:26

you very much, Jenna Paitman, for leading a very,

2:28

very fun push for this on the disc cordon and the polls,

2:31

and also some research tips as well. But

2:34

starting with Jake Heap, the question we always ask is, what's

2:36

your relationship to this topic or opinion

2:38

of the topic, world's fairs?

2:40

I don't have much of a specific relationship

2:43

that I can remember. I

2:45

generally associate it with two things. One

2:47

of inventions and discoveries and

2:50

things that are revealed to the world for the first time.

2:52

So there's that excitement kind of romance about it. But

2:55

also, there's an association, I guess, in the more

2:57

modern times of abject failure

3:00

of, you know, I

3:02

think I may have watched like a

3:04

modern marvels or something like that about world's

3:06

fairs or seeing these

3:08

YouTube videos about like abandoned places. And

3:12

my recollection, I did no research for this

3:15

conversation, but my recollection was that

3:18

there were a lot of ones

3:20

that were meant to revitalize a community

3:23

or bring in new infrastructure

3:25

and then it's just been kind of abandoned and, you

3:27

know, grown over or collapsed

3:30

or whatnot. Like I'm a big

3:32

baseball fan. And so

3:34

I'll watch any kind of baseball documentary. And

3:37

my recollection is there's at least a couple

3:39

baseball stadiums that, you know,

3:41

part of the reason they were built and part of the reason

3:44

they were such spectacular failures

3:46

was because they were specifically built for a world's

3:49

fair with the idea that like this multi-purpose

3:53

stadium is going to be used for, you

3:55

know, to show off, you know, tractors and

3:57

rockets. And then eventually a team

3:59

is. going to play here in this cavernous

4:02

concrete monstrosity. So

4:05

I think I might be thinking of Montreal, but there might be others.

4:08

And then yeah, and then just seeing footage later where

4:11

I remember like Vladimir Guerrero got

4:13

like a hit or a home run

4:15

there. And you just see the background as this

4:17

like shiny plexiglass behind

4:19

them and these baggies draped

4:22

over the wall to make the wall and these

4:25

huge decks of bleachers

4:27

that are like on their side because that's

4:30

how they configure it for a Canadian

4:32

football stadium. So just these like

4:34

horribly ugly, brutalist

4:38

kind of structures. But

4:41

then of course the beautiful one in Queens in

4:43

New York that made an appearance in

4:45

Men in Black and that where you can

4:47

see when you're watching the US Open or a Mets game

4:49

or something like that, that actually is a really

4:51

cool park, but they kind of seem to not know

4:53

what to do with it. And if

4:56

I recall there actually is a theater there

4:58

that I went and saw a show at and I just

5:00

remember thinking like, this is a really cool

5:02

thing to do once. It was

5:04

just like really out of the way. And yeah,

5:06

it's interesting that how few of them kind of

5:09

seemed to work in the long term, which

5:11

I'm thinking about here in LA as we're approaching

5:13

the Olympics in a few years and you

5:16

know, all of that, you know, people still kind

5:18

of fall for this idea of, yeah, we're

5:20

going to build all these super huge things and they're going to last forever

5:22

and it's going to revitalize and you know, once

5:24

in a while it works, but very rarely it works.

5:27

Yeah, right on.

5:29

Katie, how about you? How do you feel about these?

5:31

Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting concept.

5:34

I think that people love a big

5:36

weird thing like, and

5:39

I think that's what the World Fair was

5:41

all about, big weird things. And

5:44

some of them end up being popular

5:46

like the Eiffel Tower. Some of them

5:48

don't like all that stuff you mentioned. I

5:51

think it's interesting that we kind

5:53

of live in a post big weird

5:56

thing era, except that

5:58

there is that thing. in Vegas

6:00

now, the orb.

6:02

What's it called? The sphere? The dome?

6:06

Yeah, it's like

6:08

a big sphere

6:10

of screens and everyone's wild

6:13

about the sphere. And I think it's an

6:15

interesting, I mean, I think humanity

6:17

for a long time has enjoyed

6:20

big weird things or big gaudy

6:22

showy things like we've had, you

6:25

know, from cathedrals to big

6:27

structures that there's

6:29

some kind of reverence

6:32

towards big stuff that we

6:34

build for no other purpose

6:37

except to have this big thing. And I think,

6:40

I mean, the world's fair thing we've talked about kind

6:42

of incidentally on the show a few times, right?

6:44

Alex, like when we talked about Ferris

6:47

wheels, when we talked about pickles,

6:49

I think, and ice cream comes

6:51

up a lot.

6:53

Absolutely. Yeah, nobody needs to

6:55

hear another episode to understand this one, but

6:57

I recommend pairing it with the Ferris wheel episode.

7:00

If you haven't heard it, we talk all about the 1893 Chicago fair.

7:02

And also there's an

7:04

old episode about the screen and

7:06

the possible influence of the 1889 Paris

7:09

world's fair on that. That's also where they built the

7:11

Eiffel Tower. These are often

7:13

the debut of a big weird thing. We

7:15

all love it. But then also just

7:18

countless technologies, sciences,

7:20

cultural practices, there's too many

7:22

for us to index in an episode.

7:25

And I would like to state for the record, I am pro Eiffel

7:27

Tower, I am pro ice cream and

7:29

certainly pro pickle. So I

7:31

know, and I love the idea that from what

7:33

I understand, again, having done no research, that

7:36

the idea of a world's fair was to bring

7:38

people together from all over the world in ways

7:40

that they wouldn't otherwise to, you know,

7:42

to innovate and to share cultures like that.

7:44

That idea is really beautiful. But

7:47

no, I dig. I enjoy

7:49

ice cream. That's what I wanted to make sure was clear.

7:52

Me too. Yeah, makes

7:55

sense. And then I think there was

7:57

one again, you'll, you'll know more than I do. But I think

7:59

there was one somewhere in Tennessee, I think, that

8:01

also was meant to revitalize

8:04

the community and have these towers that just kind of got

8:06

behind Knoxville. That's

8:08

what it was.

8:09

Yeah. If if folks know a Simpsons episode

8:12

where they yeah, where the boys

8:14

go on a road trip misled by a 1982

8:17

travel guide, it leads them to the ruins of

8:19

the 1982 World's Fair in Knoxville,

8:21

Tennessee. And the former

8:23

Sunsphere is now a wig sphere storing

8:26

the boys. Yes,

8:28

that is probably the only reason I know that. Yeah,

8:31

I think I think that's a lot of Americans. Most

8:34

recent World's Fair memory is that joke

8:36

on the Simpsons, because we don't really

8:38

do them here anymore. But as you're about to talk about,

8:40

they still happen all over the world, like all the time.

8:43

And we'll get into it with a quick set of fascinating

8:46

numbers and statistics. And

8:48

this week that is in a segment called.

8:52

Stats, you

8:54

got what I need,

8:57

but you say it's just a trend

9:00

and you say numbers are trends. Oh,

9:02

baby stats.

9:09

There we go. That day was submitted by

9:11

Brian Werner. Thank you, Brian. We have a new

9:13

name for this every week. Please make a Sicilian Wacky and Bad as

9:15

possible. Submit through Discord or to Sippod at Gmail.com.

9:18

The podcast is just kind of a front

9:20

for Alex to break into the music

9:23

industry to get an agent.

9:27

The first number here, this is how

9:29

huge these are still, to my astonishment,

9:32

the number is 73 million people. That

9:35

is the attendance at the Shanghai World Expo

9:38

in 2010 and the all time biggest

9:40

attendance for a World's Fair recently.

9:42

That's an unfathomable number

9:45

of people. We

9:46

mentioned in baseball earlier, the

9:49

total attendance for all of Major League Baseball

9:51

in 2023 was about 70 million

9:54

across all of the thousands of games. And

9:56

so more people went to this one World's

9:58

Fair in Shanghai in.

10:01

2010. I can like when I try to picture a

10:03

group of people I think I max out at 15 then

10:06

my brain just like

10:07

goes to white noise.

10:10

That's

10:13

why I can't book 16 guests to join

10:15

us it won't work you can't do it. There

10:18

aren't enough windows. I

10:19

just stop rendering people

10:22

in my brain after about 15. Yeah

10:24

and

10:27

and I think us and a lot of other people we

10:29

think of World's Fairs as some kind of early

10:32

1900s or 1800s thing. They

10:34

are still huge. Wow.

10:37

And like that Shanghai one is not even really

10:39

an outlier. The 1970 World

10:42

Expo in Osaka, Japan drew 64 million

10:45

people. 1958 World's Fair

10:47

in Brussels, Belgium drew 41 million

10:50

and and that Montreal

10:52

Expo is really interesting. In 1967 the

10:55

Montreal World Expo drew a little over 50

10:57

million people. Five zero.

10:59

Wow. Where

11:00

do you put them all?

11:02

Exactly and

11:05

that was kind of the question in Canada because

11:07

this Expo also probably

11:10

set a record that will never be broken in

11:13

terms of the ratio of fair guests

11:15

versus national population. Right.

11:17

At the time there were only about 20 million Canadians

11:20

and they drew 50 million people to the Montreal

11:23

World's Fair.

11:24

I just imagine Canada like tilting

11:27

into the ocean just kind of listing

11:29

too many

11:31

people in

11:32

Montreal.

11:34

Right like that's the origin

11:37

of Quebec separatism. Is that

11:39

they just started drifting away

11:41

like an iceberg. But

11:45

yeah these things are huge

11:47

still and and there are old ones that

11:50

drew big audiences too but probably

11:52

the most amazing old one is the St. Louis,

11:54

Missouri World's Fair in 1904 because in 1904 St. Louis

11:56

drew 20 million

12:00

people. At the time, there were only 80

12:03

million people in the United States. And

12:06

also, everybody coming to that did

12:08

not travel by car or by airplane. So this

12:11

was a train trip for basically everybody,

12:13

if not an ocean voyage before that.

12:16

Man, people really wanted to get those waffle cones,

12:18

huh?

12:19

Right.

12:22

I'd risk scurvy to get a waffle

12:24

cone. But

12:27

yeah, do you know what the percentage

12:29

of people who went to that fair were from

12:31

the US, and how many were international?

12:34

Like, was this people from the US all

12:36

coming? Or was it just a

12:38

lot of international people?

12:40

Perfect question. We don't know for 1904.

12:43

And then part of the record-setting Shanghai

12:46

Expo is that almost all the visitors

12:48

were just coming from China. Right. And

12:51

so some of these modern world's fairs, especially

12:54

because as people, we now have electronic

12:56

media showing us the world, and then

12:58

most recently the internet. That has

13:01

impacted attendance somewhat. Like, there's still

13:03

a lot of people coming if it's easy, but

13:05

there seems to be less of a tradition

13:07

of global convergence of these

13:09

things.

13:10

Yeah. I also have a question about some of these numbers,

13:12

because is that however many million

13:15

admissions or is it individual

13:17

people? Because like, let's say it's, I don't know how long a world's

13:19

fair lasts, but let's say it's a 10-day affair. If

13:22

I go, if I show my past 10 times,

13:25

or is that, you know what I'm saying? Or it's like,

13:28

sometimes you'll go to a baseball game and there'll be

13:30

like 12,000 people though, but they'll announce it as a sellout

13:33

because they sold that many tickets. People

13:35

just showed up for their bobblehead and then went home. Is

13:37

there a bobblehead situation with the world's fair?

13:40

Right. Could it be like a couple guys going 10

13:43

million times each?

13:44

Yeah. Thank you. Thank you, Katie. That's

13:46

exactly, no, that number you can imagine, but

13:48

yeah. Yeah.

13:51

And Abe Simpson in and out the door, right. Yeah.

13:57

The answer varies across

13:59

every fair. the modern ones it's usually ticket

14:01

sales and the earlier ones

14:03

it's kind of guessing. Okay

14:06

and I'm not poo-pooing I mean even if you know even if it

14:08

were half of that it's still bananas

14:10

numbers that you're talking.

14:12

Yeah this is then and kind

14:14

of now one of the most popular things on earth and

14:17

especially in the US I think most of us think of

14:19

it as

14:20

a weird penny-farthing bicycle era

14:22

thing. That's not relevant at

14:24

all. I visited London recently and

14:26

I saw a guy on a penny-farthing.

14:32

Didn't seem to be doing a performance

14:34

didn't seem to be asking for tips just

14:36

riding on it. Just living. Yeah

14:39

I was mad I was angry. Thank

14:41

you Katie I hear that is the

14:43

correct response.

14:44

Speaking

14:47

of the Europeans we have some next numbers

14:49

here. These

14:51

are a fast set of years 1889 that's

14:54

when the Eiffel Tower was completed in Paris. 1962

14:57

is the year of the opening of the Space

15:00

Needle in Seattle. Those

15:03

are two prime examples of buildings that we have because

15:05

of World's Fairs and there's sort of a global

15:07

phenomenon of buildings

15:09

or neighborhoods or entire practices

15:12

that came from a World's Fair and we just don't know

15:14

it. There's too many to index and

15:16

then in contrast to that a couple

15:18

more year numbers 1893. 1893 is the original Ferris

15:23

wheel at the Chicago Columbian Exposition.

15:27

On our episode of All About It we talk about

15:29

it getting relocated reused

15:32

at the 1904 World's Fair but

15:34

then relocated again and abandoned and wrecked.

15:37

And then another year number here is 1936. 1936 is when the Crystal

15:39

Palace burned down and

15:46

the Crystal Palace was the centerpiece of the 1851

15:49

World's Fair in London. We'll talk a lot more about

15:51

it later but that and the Ferris

15:53

wheel and other monumental stuff from Fairs

15:55

are just gone. And that's the other common

15:58

phenomenon with these like a city

16:00

or a country will put massive

16:02

organizing and money into one of these and sometimes

16:04

it leaves kind of no footprint at all. What

16:09

happened in the crystal? Were they making crystal meth

16:11

in the palace? Is that why it burned down? The

16:15

name does add up. That's true. Thank

16:18

you. I recognize words.

16:22

Yeah, they named it that because

16:24

they were amazed by glass in 1851. That

16:27

makes sense. They were like, wow, a building

16:29

mostly made of glass. Can you believe it? And

16:32

now that's kind of normal. I can see

16:34

through this material. Right? So

16:37

like, wait a minute. Now I thought, is

16:39

crystal different from glass? Pretty sure

16:41

it is, right?

16:43

It is. And they just decided that it

16:45

was so magical how much glass there was, they

16:47

would give it a more heightened name.

16:48

I see. Well, lying.

16:50

It was good salesmanship, I think. You

16:52

could call it lying.

16:54

Palace of lies. But

16:57

yeah, and World's Fairs on top

16:59

of this giant structure situation,

17:01

they often have had a really weird

17:03

underbelly during their operation. Within

17:07

the giant famous stuff, like the

17:10

old time, the equivalent of that Vegas sphere, World's

17:13

Fairs had pavilions from as many countries as possible.

17:16

And especially in the past, that

17:18

would just lead directly to massive

17:20

racism. Like there were fairs that was- It's

17:23

like the Epcot syndrome. It'd

17:26

basically be, hey, look at these people from another

17:28

country. And then sometimes they would call that

17:30

a human zoo. And the spectacle would

17:33

just look at different races. And

17:36

also many fairs were trying to be on the cutting

17:38

edge of science. But then many fairs

17:41

were held in eras when eugenics was

17:43

considered cutting edge science. And

17:46

so that's just kind of a thing with a lot of, especially

17:48

the past versions of these. All right. Well,

17:51

you're off the hook.

17:55

The only time I want to hear human

17:57

zoo is in the context of aliens.

17:59

Abducting us.

18:01

Preferably

18:03

sexy aliens.

18:06

Ooh. Yeah, one of the middle chapters of Flatterhouse

18:08

Five. There we go. Great.

18:10

Yeah. I

18:11

thought that was one of the other ones, but I guess

18:13

a lot of his books have aliens in it. Donagut's

18:16

all about it. He loves it. Do

18:19

you think that people from other cultures

18:21

that knew that they were being

18:23

brought over to be sort

18:25

of authorized and observed and

18:28

judged unfavorably? Do you think

18:30

it was pitched to them as, I guess, this naive

18:32

idea? I'd had this romantic

18:34

idea of, like, we want to share your culture

18:36

with the world and have you learn other cultures. And it

18:38

turns out, no, we want to point and laugh

18:41

at you and throw popcorn to

18:43

see if you'll eat it. Measure

18:46

your head. Measure your cranium

18:48

to see how smart you are. It's

18:49

never a good sign when they break out the calipers.

18:52

Never.

18:53

Here,

18:56

place these leeches on you and see if it

18:58

makes your complexion change.

19:02

It seems like in a lot of cases it was a blurry

19:04

mix of both being

19:06

a human zoo and having their culture

19:08

shown off. Like, if some of these fairs,

19:11

people just did not understand tolerance

19:15

or humanity in a way where there was

19:17

a difference to them, I think. Anytime

19:20

you get white people involved, things

19:23

are bound to head that way. Yeah,

19:27

and then these fairs also had tons

19:30

of carnival and sideshow-type entertainment. So,

19:33

you know, sometimes they're presenting fake cryptids.

19:35

Sometimes it's basic carnival

19:37

scam stuff where you just lose money on a rigged

19:39

game. And

19:42

then also there's a maybe least

19:44

known thing where almost all world's fairs

19:46

presented erotic dancers and

19:48

stripping. Ooh, I'm back in. Hey now.

19:51

Hey now.

19:52

You lost me at the racism. You

19:54

got me back in with the, I

19:57

think you said sexy aliens, but I was honestly, I was a little bit

19:59

of a bitch. tuning you out a little bit.

20:04

Yeah this

20:06

this is not really their reputation today but takeaway

20:09

number one,

20:13

until very recently World's Fairs sold

20:15

themselves on sexy dance shows. Wow!

20:20

It turns out as recently as 1964 it was newsworthy

20:22

if a World's

20:26

Fair was not going to have nude or nearly

20:28

nude women performing.

20:30

Wait so like they there was outrage

20:32

if there weren't enough boobies?

20:35

Yeah the 1964 New

20:38

York World's Fair barred sexualized

20:41

entertainment and it got reported all over

20:43

the country in newspapers and

20:45

the Fort Worth Star Telegram had lined

20:47

it coochie coochie to be

20:49

bumped from World's Fair at New York. God! Well

20:53

at least they were taking it seriously.

20:55

Man I miss old timey headlines.

20:58

Yeah. Reporting

20:58

on a war and it's like US

21:00

and a bit of a pickle but yeah

21:03

I mean I do like

21:06

that the boobies were traditional

21:09

and we were going against traditions to

21:11

cover up the boobies.

21:14

Yeah it was just very common

21:16

at most fairs that that

21:18

article about whoochie coochie lamented

21:20

the lack of quote nudie cutie capers

21:23

plan for the fair and then

21:27

and that fair they ran it in 1964 and 1965 and due to

21:29

hugely low attendance

21:34

numbers in 64 they brought it back

21:36

for 65. They were like now will

21:39

you come because people were

21:41

kind of mainly coming through the doors of a lot of World's

21:43

Fairs for sexy shows.

21:46

Can't say that sounds like erotica

21:49

written by Dr. Seuss. The

21:52

rhyming there a lot of rhyming.

21:54

Oh the nudie cutie capers.

21:57

Yeah. That's my favorite episode

21:59

of Scooby-Doo. Yeah Right,

22:05

it's like a nude lady except for one

22:07

mask that they pull off at the end. Yeah, yeah

22:10

And they would have gotten away with it.

22:11

It weren't for those meddling kids.

22:13

Right? He's got rubies

22:18

We're like booby-doo am I right?

22:20

Got

22:23

him you guys had at the show right you can cut that out. Not

22:26

yeah, well loop it in several more times Yeah, that's

22:28

good.

22:28

That is staying in

22:29

Put that in the premium boko

22:34

Yeah, and this pattern that

22:36

New York was dealing with was a long-running thing 1933 World's

22:40

Fair in Chicago the mayor

22:42

threatened to shut down nude performances

22:45

But then they ended up popularizing a nude

22:48

dancer named Sally Rand who

22:50

was famous for her ostrich feather fan

22:52

dance ending in full nudity She

22:55

was barred from performing at the fairs So

22:57

she just repeatedly snuck into various

22:59

venues that let her do it.

23:01

Hell. Yeah Yeah,

23:03

yeah

23:04

She ended up becoming one of the biggest selling points

23:06

of the fair while doing constant outlaw

23:09

shows that were not part of the fair I love

23:12

it. That's how she found her feathers. She just

23:14

snuck into the farm exhibit and then no that's

23:16

not rich It's

23:19

whatever animal she's near yeah

23:21

That a naked lady trying to sneak

23:24

into the fair no, I believe that's an ostrich

23:26

which is okay

23:30

We do allow ostriches I guess

23:33

they're tall enough for the rides first of all there's

23:35

nothing in the rulebook that says

23:38

Nothing in the official burlesque

23:40

rulebook that says an ostrich can't

23:43

do a nudie show

23:45

The other other thing World's Fairs

23:47

did is they also scams people

23:50

with a misleading promise of nudity

23:53

Apparently in particular the 1893

23:56

Chicago World's Fair there was an

23:58

event for Algeria belly dancing.

24:00

And this is one of many World's

24:03

Fair presentations that was presented

24:05

as exotic, quote, unquote, and advertising

24:08

and things. And then it would just turn out to be

24:10

the basic meaning of exotic, of

24:12

it's from a different country than this country. Yeah,

24:17

there's

24:18

some not so great history of conflating

24:21

the two.

24:22

Yeah. So there was also that scam

24:24

being done to people looking to see nudity.

24:27

And and I think this is

24:30

not really thought about a lot with World's Fair history.

24:32

Like like that 1933 Chicago Fair,

24:35

the official theme was a century of

24:37

progress, and like amazing science

24:39

and advancement. And a lot of people were there to

24:41

see naked people. This is another

24:43

way World's Fairs were kind of the internet before

24:46

the internet was that's where

24:48

the world gathers to see it.

24:50

That really is is very interesting that like that's

24:52

something I never would have guessed. Now you think about that

24:55

time is, you know, wholesome and puritan

24:58

and, you know, when I look at

25:00

like newsreel footage of people going to World's Fairs,

25:02

you know, all the guys are in suits and the women are these,

25:04

you know, heavy, modest dresses, you know, in

25:06

the middle of summer and super humid

25:08

places. And yeah, no wonder they

25:10

wanted to take all their clothes off. But

25:14

yeah, I have no idea the sexual

25:17

element. I guess I shouldn't be surprised just because of, you

25:19

know, humans, but that

25:22

that's something I never would have guessed was was part

25:24

of that.

25:25

Yeah, me neither. Yeah, we just talk about

25:28

a guy looking at electricity for the first

25:30

time or something is what we think was happening.

25:33

Right. But if you pull back on the frame, you see, it's

25:36

actually making those sparks. Like

25:39

it's an electricity picture of a lady like,

25:41

Oh, I see. All right. Yeah.

25:43

And it kind of reminds me of the like

25:45

history of film, like moving pictures,

25:48

like one of the early things where these peep

25:50

shows where it's like, how can we get people

25:52

interested in this new technology of film?

25:55

Boobies.

25:57

Yeah. Well, that's like, that's like almost all technology,

25:59

you know, we live. All the advancements in the internet about

26:01

streaming and online payments and all that

26:03

that all came because of boobies because of porn

26:06

Absolutely. Thank you porn

26:08

the power of butts

26:10

Yes, the power of butts compels

26:12

you

26:14

Yeah, it helped give us every World's

26:16

Fair thing and It's

26:18

across the history of this next number. The next

26:20

number is 35 Mmm,

26:23

and 35 is the number of officially

26:26

recognized World's Fairs between 1851

26:28

and now But

26:31

also that number is very disputed. It

26:33

turns out it comes from a French organization

26:35

called the Bureau internationales

26:38

expositions the bi e

26:42

How come the French are always electing themselves

26:44

like? arbiters of things

26:47

they're like We have a meeting

26:50

guy. It's like who says this restaurant is good.

26:52

It's like the French and also the

26:54

tires

26:55

right Yeah,

26:58

this this is super weird because

27:01

the next number is 1928 the year 1928 is when an international

27:03

treaty created the bi e and The

27:09

goal was to have one governing body for

27:11

the timing and locations of World's Fairs

27:14

before 1928 We didn't have

27:16

that at all Places would just say

27:18

I'm doing a World's Fair now

27:19

Yeah,

27:25

Michael Scott got Jeff

27:27

yeah that Michael Scott move is take

27:30

away number two

27:34

Before 1928 every World's

27:36

Fair was a wild local gamble

27:39

Hmm

27:40

that's pretty late in the history of these from 1851 to

27:43

then right it was just a city or a country

27:46

saying We are the World's Fair

27:48

on this date in this time and hoping

27:50

everybody else played along. That's it Yeah,

27:53

which is we I had never thought about anybody running

27:55

this but I had also never thought

27:58

about the lack of somebody running this if that

28:00

makes sense, it's just been kind of happening

28:02

this way.

28:03

Right. You just kind of, it's

28:06

like when you're like, Hey, let's, let's, uh,

28:08

let's just do a party. And then there's

28:10

that moment of nervousness

28:12

five minutes before people are supposed

28:15

to start showing up. You know,

28:17

if nobody shows up, do I just kind

28:19

of do the party on my own?

28:21

Do I do a world Sarah on my own? It's

28:24

just us two guys going in and out 20, 10 million

28:27

times.

28:29

But if you threw a world's fair and nobody showed up.

28:31

Right.

28:34

That's kind of happened a lot of places. Yeah.

28:38

Even with the BIE.

28:40

Oddly. No, the BIE usually

28:42

people come, but it's got that

28:44

deal of BIE approval.

28:46

We always look for it.

28:48

Yeah. Like it turns out it really

28:51

moves the needle. One big example

28:53

comes from the 1960s because in 1962, Seattle got

28:56

BIE approval

29:00

to do a world's fair. And that's

29:02

actually the last approved world's

29:04

fair in the United States, 1962 in Seattle. Wow.

29:09

And also in order to get that approval, the leaders

29:12

of Seattle specifically glad handed

29:14

this French organization as much as possible.

29:17

Like they, they made a bunch of trips to France.

29:20

They held a meeting where they taught everybody

29:22

how to pronounce the name Seattle. They

29:25

presented like visual aids of the location

29:27

of Seattle on the earth.

29:29

Seattle. Seattle.

29:31

Seattle. No, no, Seattle.

29:38

Yeah.

29:38

I'm glad we could play that real clip of the

29:41

meeting. That wasn't anybody doing it.

29:46

But yeah, and that fair, it drew

29:48

almost 10 million visitors, which

29:51

is not huge by these standards, but was

29:53

a lot for what Seattle was going for. And

29:56

then by comparison, a couple of years

29:58

earlier, Portland, Oregon, tried to do a

30:00

big fair, and they called

30:02

it the Oregon Centennial Exposition and

30:04

International Trade Fair. They pitched it to the

30:06

whole world. Buddies. But

30:08

they didn't have BIE help, and they drew 1.5

30:11

million for all 10 in Seattle.

30:13

That's

30:15

better than I thought it would be. I thought

30:17

like 20 people might have come. But

30:20

again, I can only imagine about 15 people

30:22

at once, so.

30:23

Right. So

30:26

you really stretch it, yeah. Right. They

30:28

all leave, and then five come back. Right.

30:31

Not great.

30:34

Yeah, and like this organization

30:36

oddly has a lot of pull. They're just good at

30:38

using this international treaty and their

30:40

connections all over the world to get all

30:43

sorts of countries to participate in what's designated

30:46

a world fair. Because all of

30:48

these are kind of a Tinkerbell thing. It's just,

30:50

can you convince people there ought to be a world

30:53

fair in this year at this location

30:55

just because?

30:56

Mm. I feel like we're giving the French too

30:58

much power. They can tell us what champagne

31:01

is,

31:03

what good bread is. I don't know.

31:06

I didn't vote for them.

31:08

I don't know if you know this, but have there been

31:10

other attempts since then to get a world fair in the

31:12

US? Because it seems like a long time without one. Like

31:15

if a US city actually wanted one.

31:17

There's a really weird thing where the 1964 World's

31:21

Fair in New York City was

31:23

not officially a world's fair. Just everyone

31:25

called it that.

31:28

That's basically

31:31

what the US has been doing. We have not gotten

31:33

that approval, but things like 1982

31:35

in Knoxville and most recently 1986

31:37

in New Orleans, they

31:40

either got no approval or they got partial

31:42

approval to do what's called a specialized expo.

31:44

So 1982 in Knoxville was

31:47

officially a specialized expo celebrating

31:50

energy technology and was not

31:52

a world's fair.

31:54

Exciting.

31:55

Bye.

31:57

That's a good title for a thing. unauthorized

32:01

expo celebrating energy.

32:03

Yeah

32:04

and then and the other

32:06

weirdest thing about these guys is the BIE

32:09

don't just certify things to be

32:11

World's Fairs. They have also codified

32:13

what past events count as World's

32:16

Fairs in their opinion. Oh.

32:17

Now

32:18

hang on. Like before they existed

32:21

they are retroactively declaring various

32:23

events. World's Fairs are not World's Fairs.

32:25

They're retconning World's Fairs.

32:28

Yeah. Yeah. So they have declared

32:30

that the first ever World's Fair was 1851 in London and

32:32

then the next was 1855 in Paris and a list of 35

32:34

World's Fairs.

32:39

The most recent official one was 2020 in Dubai.

32:42

The next one is 2025 in Osaka

32:44

in Japan.

32:46

They're saying it's

32:48

canon that Dumbledore went

32:50

to this World's Fair.

32:55

When we were talking about baseball before it made me think of the Baseball

32:57

Hall of Fame again. Like they're doing that thing

32:59

where the current Baseball Hall of Fame will say this

33:02

guy in the 1920s he's also a Hall of Famer now. Which

33:04

is fine but also it's just

33:07

kind of this one organization saying so. Right.

33:10

I was in Osaka this year and I saw

33:13

no... Oh. I'm

33:15

not offended that I wasn't personally invited to

33:18

the 2025 World's Fair but it seems

33:20

odd that I saw no mention of it.

33:22

No one was talking. Like it wasn't

33:25

any of the guidebooks. It wasn't in any of the conversations

33:27

I had about oh you know we're getting the World's Fair

33:29

in a couple years. Like you think that would

33:32

be a huge thing or like this giant structure

33:34

is being built you know for the World's Fair

33:36

none of that.

33:37

I saw more ads for you know ramen places than

33:39

for the World's

33:43

Fair. Like at the airport

33:45

I'm just thinking about all the places that

33:48

I went where it seems like there would be huge signage.

33:51

Right. And there was nothing. It's

33:53

just it's it's odd. Like and yet I'm sure

33:55

they're gonna get tens of millions of people.

33:57

Yeah. Yeah.

33:58

How did marketing in the past... work

34:00

for World's Fairs? Like how when

34:02

did they start marketing the World's Fair

34:05

and how did they get the word out?

34:08

The answer is basically as soon as basic forms

34:11

of marketing were invented they applied them because

34:13

like like 1893 in Chicago

34:16

was sort of the debut of a lot of the

34:18

basic concepts of advertising like

34:20

pickle pins for Heinz products.

34:23

Pickle pins? Yeah it's a little pin

34:25

shaped like a pickle and Heinz would give it

34:27

out. Oh that would be my guess. I

34:29

know it sounds like a writing pin shaped

34:32

like a pickle that you can write

34:33

with. I like that

34:35

idea. I thought it was something meant to pierce the pickle

34:37

just to you know get out that extra extra juice.

34:40

Oh I want to I'm gonna Google this I want to get a pickle

34:42

pin.

34:42

It's a medal of honor for the pickle

34:44

that you pin on to the pickle.

34:46

Congratulations

34:49

pickle you've done it.

34:51

Yeah and that and that promotion challenge

34:53

is part of why especially

34:55

in the late 1800s this was a just a massive

34:57

gamble by so many cities and

35:00

apparently from the 1880s to the 1910s so 30 plus years

35:05

they stopped at World War One but 1880s to

35:08

1910s world cities held more than 40

35:10

international expositions that

35:13

were pitched to some sort of World's Fair so

35:15

more than once a year there was a place saying

35:17

this they were as fair flying as

35:20

Melbourne Australia 1888 Hobart Tasmania 1894 Guatemala City

35:27

1897 and the French colonial city of Hanoi in 1902 and 1903

35:29

all said we're

35:34

the world's fair. I'm starting to interrupt but

35:37

I did a little googling and it turns out

35:39

that you can get pickle pins from

35:41

the Heinz History Center online

35:44

they're five dollars and seventy cents I was like

35:46

I don't know if I want to pin that. They're sold in quantities

35:48

of ten that's ten pins for five

35:51

dollars and seventy cents

35:53

that's pretty good

35:53

I can imagine ten people wearing

35:56

ten pickle pins

35:57

and they have 3570 in

36:01

stock as of this recording so

36:04

I'm listening to this they might only have 3560

36:07

by the time we're done. Get

36:09

them all you can.

36:10

Katie don't think about that number. Katie watch out.

36:13

Sorry. Too many

36:15

pickle pins. These

36:19

probably are reproductions if I'm being honest.

36:21

Alright, starting it off but I get distracted

36:24

by pickle pins.

36:26

All these events are as random

36:28

as a pickle pin. Oh

36:30

I like. Would you find that fun?

36:32

Great. Can we can we use that phrase? That's

36:34

as random as a pickle pin.

36:36

It does sound good.

36:37

Yeah. Alright I'm gonna try

36:40

to move that in. Alright sorry to interrupt you were telling

36:42

me about something somewhat.

36:45

No it's it's it's on theme

36:47

like yeah yeah I just I love this

36:49

situation where there is a version

36:52

of the International Olympic Committee for World's Fairs

36:54

now. Mm-hmm. And before

36:56

that the entire world every

36:58

city that felt important was just saying I'm

37:01

the World's Fair now and nobody nobody

37:03

do this year that it's my year and

37:05

it was a weird fight between. Yeah

37:08

the Wild West out there. Yeah

37:12

and then and then in the process they all set

37:14

up sexy dance shows and and

37:16

tried to build a weird building to draw everybody.

37:19

Crazy man.

37:20

Yeah it's like when you have a

37:22

college party and then someone else is

37:25

like well I'm gonna have a party on the same day. You're

37:27

not my friend if you don't show up to my party

37:29

but it's like a whole country.

37:33

Yeah yeah really and and

37:35

guys who spent millions of dollars of

37:37

old-timey money on it and they're

37:39

like I hope the biggest fortune in

37:41

the world comes back to me.

37:43

Was this always sort

37:45

of government funded or was it private

37:48

entrepreneurs?

37:50

It was both and it's tilted toward

37:52

private companies over time like yeah

37:54

more and more it's been a pavilion from especially

37:57

in 1964 it was like GE and

37:59

Coke. forward and before that it

38:01

tended to be national governments.

38:04

The Heinz pickles.

38:06

Yeah, and Heinz and stuff, yeah. So it's sort

38:08

of, Olympics are sort

38:10

of a thing that has evolved from this in terms

38:12

of practices where we're like everything is

38:15

branded. But yeah.

38:16

Also, the doping I understand has gotten crazy

38:19

in the world's fair market.

38:22

It's

38:24

too muscular of a guy giving out pickle pens,

38:27

like stabbing through people. And

38:31

folks, that's the whole progression of these. We

38:34

are going to take a quick break before returning

38:36

with the most bizarre structure in

38:38

world's fair history.

38:40

Is it giant ostrich

38:42

feather

38:43

boobies? I'm

38:46

staying tuned for that.

38:56

Folks I know I say this every week. It's

38:58

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42:14

And we are back and with an answer,

42:17

what is that weirdest structure? And also

42:19

more fundamentally, why have there

42:22

been a bunch of world's fairs? Why does this keep

42:24

happening? The answer is takeaway

42:26

number three.

42:30

One London event created the practice

42:32

of recurring world's fairs by

42:35

making Paris jealous of a giant greenhouse.

42:40

Yeah, this is about the Crystal Palace, which

42:42

was built in London and is misleadingly

42:45

named. It's a giant glass structure

42:47

that was designed by a guy who was a professional

42:49

builder of greenhouses.

42:51

Ah, interesting.

42:54

Was it full of plants

42:56

or

42:56

was it just they liked the sort

43:00

of look of it being all glass?

43:02

The second thing, they just like that look.

43:05

And my

43:07

negative reading of this guy is he

43:09

was good at building greenhouses and said,

43:12

what if the British Empire and

43:14

British royal family put all of the

43:16

money they could possibly could into just making

43:18

the biggest greenhouse ever built? And that was as

43:20

far as his creativity went. Right.

43:23

Yeah, because it's like it just does

43:26

kind of look like a greenhouse, but really

43:28

big.

43:29

And that's that's the experience you want as

43:31

a visitor is you want when you're

43:34

in the middle of the summer in London, right? Wearing,

43:36

wearing, wearing heavy, non-breathable

43:39

clothing. You want to be in

43:41

a greenhouse.

43:42

Yeah, I've always I've always wanted

43:45

the experience of being a little ant

43:48

under the magnifying glass of

43:50

a 12 year old boy.

43:51

Yeah, if you sit in there long enough, a potato would

43:53

grow out of your armpit.

43:55

Yeah,

43:58

and basically illustration. of this. There aren't

44:00

a lot of pictures, but there were some

44:03

plants at some of the setups, I think just because

44:05

that's decor and they could. And it

44:07

wasn't greenhouse hot, but it was just a

44:09

big glass and iron structure. And

44:12

they blew people's minds because it

44:14

wasn't made of brick or whatever. Oh,

44:16

that's interesting. You

44:18

could see through it kind of, and they

44:20

said, wow, I've never seen this big of a building

44:23

with this big of windows. It was before

44:25

high rises and stuff. This is 1851. So

44:28

you didn't even have to pay to get into the

44:31

sexy butt shows because you could see right

44:33

in there.

44:37

And so that was so impressive to Paris

44:39

that they were like, oh yeah, we're gonna build a big

44:41

tower.

44:42

Eventually, basically, yeah, because what

44:45

was happening here

44:47

is 1851 London, the World's Fair was

44:50

sort of an ordinary event other than this

44:52

Crystal Palace building. Beyond

44:55

that, it was an exposition of industry

44:57

and technology and also stuff from

44:59

the world. And a bunch

45:03

of other countries had been doing that, in particular

45:05

France. France felt

45:07

like they were the leader in technological and

45:09

scientific expositions. They were

45:11

like in charge of that and then

45:13

got very upset when the British leapt

45:16

beyond them with this Crystal Palace building.

45:18

Yeah, I love that. So French to

45:21

be jealous and mad and then try

45:23

to like basically say, no,

45:26

we're the ones who decide whether

45:29

buildings are cool or that

45:31

wine is champagne or not. It's

45:34

us.

45:35

Yeah,

45:36

they were like, we really don't like

45:38

that the British seem to be ahead of us by

45:41

putting together. It wasn't even

45:43

called a World's Fair, but it was called the

45:45

Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All

45:48

Nations.

45:50

And this was bigger than what the

45:52

French had done. It displayed more than a hundred

45:54

thousand objects across more than 10 miles

45:57

of exhibition space. Whoa.

45:59

If you sort of wow. around it walking you would

46:01

walk 10 miles.

46:02

That's a lot.

46:03

I get those steps in. Yeah.

46:05

I feel like I'd need at least two

46:08

two pickles on a stick to make

46:10

it.

46:11

Yeah and they they kind of drew a massive

46:13

audience partly because of the humongousness

46:16

of it. Like they made a profit, drew

46:18

more than six million guests. It was a huge smash

46:21

success financially too. But

46:23

the the biggest draw was this crystal

46:26

palace that just captured people's imaginations.

46:29

Sir Joseph Paxton was a professional greenhouse

46:31

builder and so he just pitched

46:33

a gigantic glass and iron structure

46:36

that would not be that hot but would be four

46:38

times the size of St. Peter's Basilica

46:40

in Rome. Central

46:42

fountain standing 27 feet high

46:44

made of four tons of glass. It was

46:46

just the most glass and then that

46:48

was the main reason people came was to see

46:51

all the glass.

46:52

How much did it cost to build this thing?

46:55

Oh I don't have a figure.

46:57

In pounds.

46:59

In pounds.

47:02

And how long how long did it take to build this?

47:05

In pounds. Years

47:11

sterling? I don't know. Uh in

47:13

in credit here.

47:18

Part of why they kind of didn't sweat the money is

47:20

one of a couple of people very involved in running

47:22

this was Prince Albert, the husband

47:24

of Queen Victoria. So with

47:27

him being into it and with the British Empire

47:29

robbing and raiding the whole world they basically

47:32

had a blank check. They could they could do whatever they wanted.

47:35

And that's what they chose to do. They

47:37

chose to build a giant glass house.

47:41

Yeah and and this made France very

47:43

mad and so as soon

47:46

as they possibly could Paris put on a rival

47:48

exhibition in 1855 and

47:51

then by BIE standards the

47:53

next world's fair was London 1862. So

47:56

then the next world's fair was Paris 1867. And

48:00

as you look at the timeline, it's basically

48:03

another city does a World's Fair, so then Paris

48:06

does a World's Fair. And then

48:08

another city does a World's Fair, so then Paris does a

48:10

World's Fair. At an

48:12

event this size, they basically started planning the

48:14

next one after, you know, like they're just like,

48:16

Great Fair, what's our next fair? With the

48:19

Paris attitude toward all this.

48:21

I kind of admire it. They wanted to stay on top.

48:23

Yeah, and like that's why they're where the

48:25

BIE is based. It's partly because all

48:28

these fairs kept happening there, so why not? Like,

48:31

makes sense was the logic. Has

48:33

Paris had the most fairs officially, of

48:35

the official 35 fairs? Have most of them been

48:38

in Paris? Yeah, there's

48:40

also more diversity now

48:42

in terms of a new city every

48:44

time, so Paris will probably have the record

48:46

forever. They just did a lot of them early on.

48:49

Paris, more like unfairus.

48:53

For their fairs.

48:56

Yeah, and so these people

48:58

weren't just inventing the idea of a World's Fair,

49:00

they were inventing the idea that we needed to keep

49:02

doing them. They were inventing

49:04

the idea of an inferiority complex as well. Yeah.

49:10

Right, psychological science, advancing.

49:14

But yeah, and even as Paris did all

49:16

this, that Crystal Palace stood for a long

49:18

time because the British used

49:21

it in the exhibition, then disassembled it,

49:23

put it in South London instead. And

49:26

it kept hosting events for many decades. I'll

49:29

link an Atlas Obscura piece about a

49:31

particularly funny event in the 1870s

49:34

where cat fanciers held a cat

49:36

show to try to improve the reputation

49:39

of cats. Because

49:41

in the 1870s they were seen as gross street animals

49:44

that just hunt mice and not pets

49:46

yet.

49:47

Did it work?

49:48

Barely it helped, yeah. It helped –

49:51

we have a whole episode about cat food I'll link to. It

49:53

helped create a trend of humans actively

49:55

feeding cats as pets

49:58

in Europe.

49:59

Have you ever seen a cat

50:02

in humidity? It's not pretty.

50:03

Ooh, green house. Yeah,

50:06

there's not a lot of greenhouse cats, huh? No. I

50:08

would love to visit a giant greenhouse full of

50:10

cats. That's sort of my dream.

50:13

Yeah, I don't know. For me, it's, I love cats,

50:15

but have you ever pet a cat when

50:17

your hand is sweaty? It just is,

50:20

it all comes off. All the fur

50:22

is now on your hand. Now your hand is a cat.

50:25

Yeah. Well,

50:28

thank you for ruining my dreams. I appreciate that.

50:31

That's my job.

50:34

And yeah, and so this this remained

50:37

an iconic part of London.

50:39

Apparently at one point they had put enough additions

50:41

on the Crystal Palace that it was the largest building

50:44

in the world by volume.

50:46

But then it kind of lost allure

50:49

and novelty after many decades. And it

50:51

was semi-abandoned when a fire started in 1936

50:53

and burned it down.

50:56

I can't imagine how a fire

50:59

would start in a building

51:01

made of glass,

51:04

where the sun goes through glass.

51:07

I'm trying to see. Someone put

51:09

a piece of paper at the bottom of it. And

51:13

that was the that was the end.

51:15

What if what if the fire started because they

51:17

finally depolluted London's sky?

51:20

Like finally there was sunlight. That immediately.

51:22

Yeah, there was enough to focus like a magnifying

51:24

glass. But

51:27

yeah, and so that building is gone. It's also

51:29

weirdly known to soccer fans. Oh, yeah. There's

51:33

a soccer team called Crystal Palace that started

51:35

in that general area. It's named after

51:38

the building that created World's Fairs and a bunch of other

51:40

stuff.

51:42

Somehow soccer and

51:45

a giant building made out

51:47

of almost entirely glass doesn't seem

51:49

like it go together.

51:52

But then you add in the caps and

51:54

it makes perfect sense. Right.

51:55

There you go. Now it's all coming

51:57

together. Maybe it burnt down.

51:59

is one of the cat fanciers who lost

52:02

and the cat pageant

52:04

bore grudge.

52:06

Hmm, they're very, they're very

52:08

grudgeful people, the cat fanciers.

52:10

Truly frightening people. We're

52:30

very much

52:30

guests and the host of the show, Go Fact

52:32

Yourself, here on Maximum Fun, along with his

52:34

co-host, Helen Hong. And then

52:36

wonderful comedy guests and astounding

52:39

special guests, because not only is there

52:42

humor and trivia and interesting information,

52:45

there's also people getting to basically meet

52:47

the person of their dreams in terms

52:49

of an interest that they have and something they're passionate

52:51

about. There's a recent episode of that show

52:54

with our buddy Jason Pardrian meeting

52:56

a guest who I jaw-dropped

52:58

when I started hearing their name and voice. I just couldn't

53:00

believe it. So Go Fact Yourself

53:02

is the podcast. You're gonna love it. Please check

53:05

it out. And Go Fact Yourself

53:07

is not the only thing we're linking, because welcome

53:09

to the outro with fun features for you, such

53:11

as help remembering this episode with a

53:13

run back through the big takeaways.

53:19

Takeaway number one, until very

53:21

recently, World's Fairs sold

53:23

themselves on sexy dance shows.

53:26

Takeaway number two, before 1928,

53:30

every World's Fair was a wild

53:32

local gamble. Takeaway number three,

53:35

one London event created the practice

53:38

of recurring World's Fairs by

53:40

making Paris jealous of

53:42

a giant greenhouse. And

53:44

beyond that, many mind-boggling numbers,

53:47

especially about when Fairs happened

53:49

and how many million bajillion

53:51

people went to them. Those

53:56

are the takeaways. Also, I said that's the main

53:58

episode, because there is more sea- secretly incredibly

54:00

fascinating stuff available to you

54:03

right now if you support this show

54:05

at MaximumFun.org. Members

54:08

get a bonus show every week where we explore one

54:10

obviously incredibly fascinating story related

54:13

to the main episode. This week's bonus topic

54:15

is how Robert Moses and Walt

54:17

Disney ended American

54:20

World's Fairs. Visit sifpod.fun

54:23

for that bonus show, for a library of more

54:25

than 14 dozen other secretly incredibly

54:27

fascinating bonus shows, and a catalog

54:29

of all sorts of MaxFun bonus shows, including

54:32

special episodes of Go Fact Yourself. It's

54:34

special audio, it's just for members. Thank

54:36

you for being somebody who backs this podcast

54:39

operation. Additional fun things,

54:41

check out our research sources on

54:43

this episode's page at MaximumFun.org.

54:47

Key sources this week include the book

54:49

Fair America by historians Robert

54:51

W. Rydell, John E. Findling,

54:53

and Kimberly D. Pell, plus

54:56

further books on the 1893 Chicago

54:58

World's Fair, the 1964-1965 New

55:00

York World's Fair, plus digital

55:03

resources from the British Library, the Smithsonian,

55:05

the Oregon Historical Society, and

55:07

more. That page also features

55:09

resources such as native-land.ca. I'm

55:13

using those to acknowledge that I recorded this in Lenapehoking,

55:16

the traditional land of the Munsee Lenape people

55:18

and the Wapinger people, as well as the

55:20

Mohican people, Skadigook people and others.

55:23

Also Katie taped this in the country of Italy. Jay

55:26

Keith taped this on the traditional land of the Gabrielino-Wartongva

55:29

people and the Wainenu people. I

55:31

want to acknowledge that in my location, Jay Keith's location,

55:33

and many other locations in the Americas and

55:36

elsewhere, native people are very much

55:38

still here. That feels worth doing on

55:40

each episode. And join the free

55:42

SIF Discord, where we're sharing stories and resources

55:45

about native people and life. There's a link

55:47

in this episode's description to join that Discord.

55:50

We're also talking about this episode on the Discord. And

55:53

hey, would you like a tip on another episode?

55:55

Because each week I'm finding you something randomly

55:58

incredibly fascinating. Bye! all the past

56:00

episode numbers through a random number

56:02

generator. This week's pick is episode 108.

56:06

That's about the topic of American cheese and

56:09

that episode features special guest Bill Oakley,

56:11

a Simpsons writer and the creator of the steamed

56:13

hams bet, so basically the best

56:15

comedy bet involving cheeseburgers, American

56:18

cheese on them. So I recommend that episode.

56:20

I also recommend my co-host Katie Golden's

56:22

weekly podcast Creature Feature about

56:25

animals and science and more. Our

56:27

theme music is Unbroken Unshaven by the

56:29

Budos Band. Our show logo is by artist

56:31

Sperton Durand. Special thanks to Chris

56:33

Souza for audio mastering on this episode.

56:36

Special thanks to the Beacon Music Factory

56:38

for taping support. Extra

56:40

extra special thanks go to our members and thank

56:43

you to all our listeners. I'm thrilled to say

56:45

we will be back next week with

56:48

more secretly incredibly fascinating.

56:51

So how about that? Talk

56:54

to you then. Maximum

57:13

Fun.

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