Can Do. 1939, 1940

One can, if one will. One person matters. The nation comes out of the doldrums one more time. The great fair promises to be the greatest show the world has ever seen. New York is up to it, as no other place is. The hub of the universe, a seat of energy and talent, a place of diversity and wisdom, a locus for some of the greatest people living on god's fair earth at the time. Enough. Let me set the table for you, as we wend our way down a few more lanes of common history, of special history, of the world at war, of the world at play, the world on town steps. Those fine humans of the period would jam the fair outside of the city of New York to gawk at the latest wonders the corporations of America created for them to buy. New York. World's Fair, 1939 and 1940.

That is to say, the genius of America was once again at work creating stuff we never knew we needed. Stuff we would, gladly, work to the bone to buy. The telephone had come into our lives in a big way by then. The car was gussied up inside, to look like your living room . Tv was shown in primitive form. Live broadcasts from the fair. And there were the kitchen things, like dishwashers. New- styly floor cleaners. You said "Bissell," and everyone knew it was a floor cleaner, or take the brownie camera. Look at the New York world's fair model. The electric razor which didn't work so well, but so what. It was another miracle. What would they think of next?

FDR put up a benediction, for this festival of things to go well. He stood proud, as thousands of American thinkers, architects and workerrs scurried to put this whole show together and then said stuff; like this, for an example. "The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today." Whatever that means. But it has a ring to it, you know. And then he goes on to say, "Let us move forward with strong and active faith."

Whatever he means, people got it. I suppose that is what counts. They heard the master salesman, our big father, tell us to go out and dream in public, to buy something for America, to plan for the future, because that future was to be a big and grand one.

And so it became, for the nation that would fight and bleed in a world war that was unparalled for its death-dealing machines. But this was before all that; the optimism was a lush pill to get us over the depression. FDR promised material abundance for most of us, if only we held the dream, and the dream was on display out there on Flushing Meadow for two years.

Wrentham met the seasons of 1939 with its customary aplomb. Life went on, as they say. Town clerk, Franklin A. Dunlap. Superintendant of Schools, Arthur W. Hale. Local Moth Superintendant, Ernest B. Mayshaw. The town report lists the many marriages that year. By date, name, residence, who married them in the ceremony.

We have the births and the deaths listed. Name of parents of the new baby,when it was born . Sadly, the date of death, name and cause of death.

In the annual report of the Board of Selectmen, the following; "The unemployment situation improved in the summer and fall months and we ended the year in fine condition. The Board at this time wishes to thank the Winter Bros. Company for the splendid cooperation in hiring back the Wrentham unemployed."

The Chief of Police reported, among other things, that 8 disturbed the peace and suffered arrest. That 21 vagrants and tramps were arrested. That "there were 16 boys or girls caught and returned to their people or to the schools."

The library has, in 1939, 9,174 books by year's end.

The Sweatt Fund Committee reports on the hurricane damage that year on trees in the park. Some 33 men worked on the WPA in Wrentham. WPA funds for the year are 29,000$. The workers assisted in cleaning up the damage the hurricane wrought.

The Water Commissioners purchased a De Laval pump. It actually pumped " 10% more than the guaranteed amount. The cost of this equipment was $4, 195.00. The appropriation was $4200."

In the list of women we see a number whose occupation is listed as "at home."

In the poll tax list on page 19 is one Edward J. O'Connor, age 35, 86 Dedham Street. Occupation, Duckman.

Last, the Superintendant of Schools speaks of a demographic trend in the town; "the rapid decrease in the proportion of children to adults." He states further; "It is probable that our school population has reached its peak and will not change much in the next few years." Enough for the moment on Wrentham. I flip now to the troubled seas of the world.

The Graf Spee, the German warship,cleaved its fast path over the waterways picking off targets at will. Captain Langsdorff knew his craft. He destroyed some few merchant ships, offloaded the sailors to his supply ship, then relentlessly searched for more British boats to commit to the deep. For the Fuhrer. Graf Spee was a pocket battleship.

In fast order, went the Clement, the Newton Beech, the Ashlea, then later, the African Shell. Prowling between the coasts of Africa and South America, the vessel ran unmolested. 'Till she met the Exeter, the HMS Exeter, and her two Achilles- class sisters.

But for the moment, we go back to the preparation for the fair that would overshadow in grandeur and variety all other fairs. To New York. And President Roosevelt.

In an opening day speech, on April 30, 1939 he waxed poetic some more . "Our wagon is hitched to a star. But it is a star of good will, a star of progress for mankind, a star of greater happiness and less hardship, a star of international goodwill and above all, a star of peace." Nice words, good images. The war came anyways. As he spoke, the German Navy raided.

The look up into the heavens, is what the fair was all about . Buildings, and particularly sculpture, soared high. Visiting the fair became a wonderful memory in a number of peoples' lives. Bring on more lights, electric lights!

The fair would extol the practical virtues of the airplane, the credit card, new at the time. The insurance policy, the automatic cash register, the electric razor, the dishwasher , the powerful telegraph systems, the new-style buildings. This was going to be a party. What a party!

On the lonely, the unfriendly seas, the Graf Spee met a come-upance. This is Rear Admiral Sir Henry Harwood of the British Navy. Captain Langsdorff would kill himself on the night of December 20, 1939. The history book in which the exploits of the Spee are related, goes to say, "during his cruise Langsdorff had sunk nine British ships..."

The Exeter is badly damaged in battle. The other two craft, the Achilles and the Ajax, dog the German ship. There is damage to the Graf Spee. The vessel puts into neutral harbor, Montevideo. In New York the fair is a grand hit, a bright light to usher in the nineteen forties. May they be better for the U. S., than the thirties were! Hope springs. Spirits are raised on the streets of big cities and those of small towns. The fair will draw some millions to plod, tour, amble and marvel, to eat and gather souvenirs.

Please hear from Marilyn Burke Trainor of Placentia, Calif. She went to this fair that was to celebrate the everyday life of the common person. She says, "Those days of the fair are probably the last truly happy memories of my childhood." Her family, father, mother, and brother, would play a part in the war, in one way or another. She so cherished that childhood that was over by the time the war ended. She testifies; "those warm, happy memories of the '39 World's Fair have never faded..... They represent a time of real family closeness that would never come again. And it was fun!"

On seas, the Graf Spee that had terrorized merchant ships made repairs, or so it seemed. The British Navy had engaged the German war machine. America's men and women would have something other than the depression, now, to occupy and worry them. We went into the war about a year after the fair was dismantled.

The fair was white. Pristine kind of white. It was the white of a First Communion dress. This white was everywhere at the fair. The white of innocence, of light, of cleanliness, of hope. Please hear the words of one , anonymous, who went to the fair and says," My enduring impression is one of whiteness, even thought its official colors were orange and blue. But the massive symbols of the fair, the Trylon and Perisphere, were stark white, and there was the white foam of the playing fountains everywhere, or so it seemed.

From suburban New Jersey we visited the Fair as often as we could. It was such an upbeat antidote to the Depression- the implied promise of better times was palpable.

My memory of the fair was one of white enchantment that extended my knowledge of the world and its inhabitants( superficially to be sure) as no elementary classroom in Bergen County could."

Mister and Mrs. Average came to gawk, to buy souvenirs by the millions, to eat at one of the eighty restauraunts, to space out, in front of national pavilions, to see the water show and the pretty girls of Billy Rose's gala .

Oh, it was a time, never to be forgotten, a time of newness and hope, before the curtain of war would be drawn. That upbeat sense permeated a nation, tired of economic troubles. The uncertainty of life is what did it most.... I mean it just wore you out, worrying about how to survive, and how to pull your family through the troubles. The people were plain tired of worrying about money and the lack thereof. This was a party, time to kick of your shoes and say , "wow, what a wonderful world it really is, if only we can have jobs and homes and peace."

The visitors came from all over, to the fair, to replenish a vanished supply of optimism and faith, in humans. They saw it all, never forgot it. Here is some more witness and testimony, this time from Doctor Elizabeth Hunter, Setauket, N.Y. She is witnessing, is all. A most puzzling event it would seem; people having fun. "I remember vividly seeing hundreds of people sitting at sidewalk cafes drinking a lovely-looking amber liquid with a white head, from clear glasses rounded at the top. I finally asked my fifteen-year-old sister what they were drinking and she informed me with sophisticated disdain that it was beer."

A big party, it was. A national party that would run two years, drawing forty million souls, some ten million less than was needed to mark it a financial success, but what the heck, it was a party. At first there was an emphasis on education and the promise of a complex technological future whose saga would be told in the various displays, but we all know that is not what we Americans want. Forget all those statistics and musty facts.

By the second year of the fair, 1940, the emphasis was altered. It became fun and entertainment that the fair offered. Education and self-improvement won't sell. So let's have a party, go on rides, gape at pretty women and lovely statues. View those waterfalls that make you think you died and went straight to heaven. What we needed was a good time, not a school classroom. The Fair offered that, the second year, but attendance still fell from that of the first year.

I should not go on and on, like this. After all, we are celebrating the local genius and fellow-about-town, Stanley G. Chilson, but the threads connect. Same country. Same hope for a better future and a better life, somehow. Despite the war almost on us, despite a crippling depression and the local hard times, hard-scrabble times, there was this feeling in the air. Chilson picked it up. He had an antenna up there, waving in the breeze of Wrentham, or should I say, he had, up there in the breeze, some antennae. He portrayed the country men and country women in his movies in such a way they showed a solid strength, a definite confidence, in the way they walked and carried themselves. To look at the citizens of Wrentham, is to see them have hope and an optimism in the new decade. Things would get better. They just had to, by gum.

What a fair it was, if we may go back to the big apple, one more time. Suzanne Howe Cardwell, Dryden, N.Y. " I remember watching the cows being milked mechanically. They were on some sort of conveyor belt, and children watched Elsie the Borden Cow become the star of the year.

Things seemed so permanent. Beautiful flowers surrounded the many international buildings, and I would compare it all with Disney World today. I wished for it to go on forever, but alas, it was torn down. My wonderful playground vanished in the dust, but the memories remain with fondness."

What moves me most about the fair, squarehead that I am, is the statues. The idea in them is one of grandness, of soaring prayer, that the world will be safe from economic and international ruin. Little did we know , nothing would work. At least in the short haul.

The columns in the sky are symbols of hope. When we cease to erect statues, it will be time for us all to burrow into some hole in the ground and stay there. The statues are emblems of faith and this fair had some just perfectly breathless sculptures and statues, lighting fixtures, poles and obelisks. That is what I like the most, the statues and poles.

My cherished wish is to partake of coffee at the fair. I see myself traveling now, on the wings of imagination. The columns and statues are before me. But I need a coffee break, a chance to sit and compose myself.

I have one request to make to the Imaginary Gift-granter in the sky. One thing I would like, above all. You see there is a coffeeshop on the grounds. Its formal name is the Maxwell House-Wards Mayflower Donut shop. The book says it was " an inexpensive feeding spot." I don't eat donuts. It's the Maxwell house I seek, good to the last drop. More than Billy Rose's aquafest, more than the cow with a woman's name, more than the "Gypsy Rose Lee's Streets of Paris, 25 cents adults only, " I want to go to the coffee spot, sit at those tables and think about everything in my life. How lucky I am to be an American in 1939, how fortunate to be at the greatest fair the world has ever known.

In Wrentham, Chilson is busy at work, portraying the citizenry , as they climb up and down stairs, worship and vote. A free people who will be threatened, as never before, by a foreign power of awesome proportion

On the high seas, as they say, the Brits had met the enemy, engaged it. The Graf Spee moved out of the harbor of Montevideo. Huge crowds gathered to get a look at the battle that would ensue, off shore; another spectacle to cherish. But , lo, the ship had debarked its sailors. Strange. I refer now to the book on this matter. "By the middle of the afternoon," it is a Sunday in December, "800 men had left the ship. It was therefore clear that she could not fight." The Germans blew the ship up.

For four days the Graf Spee burned. In his suicide letter, Captain Langsdorff records his feelings about "scuttling the pocket-battleship Admiral Graf Spee. I am happy to pay with my life for any possible reflection on the honour of the flag. I shall face my fate with firm faith in the cause and the future of the nation and of my Fuhrer."

And back at the World's fair, the American party continued into the right-beautiful night, with all its lights and spots and gleaming beams that went back and forth like a giant metronome. It was the biggest this or that, the world had ever known. War would wait a bit. The biggest cash register, the greatest display of whatever was being featured. Wonder Bread came at us with the miracle of aeration which would make the bread more tasty and palatable. Air could make this fine slab more healty in ten different ways. Oh,the wonder that science is.

In Wrentham and in other little places, life went on. The world of small towns looked anxiously on the greater scene, with wonder and fear both, as the bigger apple, our earth, moved too fast to the future. 1940. The moderator was Harry B. Stringer. Field Driver, George A Lockwood. "Only one person was killed during the year of 1940 on our Town highways," says the Chief in his report to the town.

Mister John A. Warren, Chairman of the School Committee reports,"We are living in terrible times. The affairs of the world are fraught with too much peril to the American Way of Life to admit any bickering over ways or methods."

He says the schools must lead the way in providing lessons in civic duty. He argues," the school is the bulwark of Democracy."

The high school principal , Earle F. Swett, adds the schools have " a job to train a great army of American citizens for their duties during years of crisis." War would require steadfast faith in the American system. The World's fair would remind people of the promise and abundance that lay in store.

I was a few years old, too young to remember anything. I did not go to the fair, so I must imagine a lot. In my mind, I am visiting the fair, with the ones lucky enough to go. Here is Pearl Altman of Brooklyn. She went as a young girl. She came of a "dingy tenement in Brownsville," and at the Westinghouse exhibit, there was an artist who on the very spot, designed for this child a "fantastic kitchen of the future." She remembers like it was yesterday. "She carefully placed the sketch in a blue and orange tube. The paper is yellowed and frayed, but I can still recall what this meant to a thirteen-year-old girl who lived in a dingy tenement in Brownsville." This fair was a place of common miracles, millions and millions of them. Almost as many as there were visitors. Maybe even forty million miracles. Continues our little visitor of that year, "The World's Fair was a magical, enchanting land of the future. Each time I visited, I felt like Dorothy entering the Land of Oz.

Sometimes I wonder if I dreamed some of those magnificent sights. "

That's how the world felt then. Peoples' future dreams were to become our daily reality. The world of wonderful stores, cars that do everything but drive themselves, tv, and electric this and that, products that can think. The think tankers at MIT call them smart machines.

War would come. The pavilion of the Polish nation and the Czechoslovakian nation would become shrines to mourn at. Yet there was hope still and a joy in the marvels of life in these United States.

Grace Smith, Winter Springs, Fla. Florida. " I was born and raised near the Fairgrounds. When I was five, my father took me to the Fair. There was an organ-grinder with his little monkey, who was dancing to his music. My father bent down and handed me a penny to give the monkey. He was dressed in a little red suit with a small hat on his head. As I handed him the penny, he tipped his little hat to me. That memory has stayed with me almost fifty years. It is such an important and fond memory because my father , whom I dearly loved, passed away a few months later. But I have the wonderful moment in time, imbedded in my mind."