Editing Century 21 Exposition (section)

==Cold War and Space Race context==
The fair was originally conceived at a [[Washington Athletic Club]] luncheon in 1955 to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1909 [[Alaska–Yukon–Pacific Exposition]], but it soon became clear that that date was too ambitious. With the [[Space Race]] underway and [[Boeing]] having "put Seattle on the map"<ref name=lesson25>[http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Pacific%20Northwest%20History/Lessons/Lesson%2025/25.html Lesson Twenty-five: The Impact of the Cold War on Washington: The 1962 Seattle World's Fair] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110101081352/http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Pacific%20Northwest%20History/Lessons/Lesson%2025/25.html |date=January 1, 2011 }}, HSTAA 432: History of Washington State and the Pacific Northwest, Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest, University of Washington. Accessed online October 18, 2007.</ref> as "an aerospace city",<ref name=Berger>{{cite web|last=Berger|first=Knute|title=How Sputnik 'Beeped' Seattle into the 21st Century|work=[[Crosscut.com|Crosscut]]|date=October 3, 2007|url=http://www.crosscut.com/mossback/7876/How+Sputnik+'beeped'+Seattle+into+the+21st+century/|access-date=August 20, 2011|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080516124140/http://crosscut.com/mossback/7876/How+Sputnik+%27beeped%27+Seattle+into+the+21st+century/|archive-date=May 16, 2008|url-status=dead}}</ref> a major theme of the fair was to show that "the United States was not really 'behind' the Soviet Union in the realms of science and space". As a result, the themes of space, science, and the future completely trumped the earlier conception of a "Festival of the [American] West".<ref name=lesson25 />

In June 1960, the [[Bureau International des Expositions]] (BIE) certified Century 21 as a world's fair.<ref name=Boswell/> Project manager Ewen Dingwall went to Moscow to request Soviet participation, but was turned down. Neither the People's Republic of China, Vietnam nor North Korea were invited.<ref name=Boswell>Sharon Boswell and Lorraine McConaghy, [http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/special/centennial/september/future.html A model for the future] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071017010718/http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/special/centennial/september/future.html |date=October 17, 2007 }}, ''[[The Seattle Times]]'', September 22, 1996. Accessed online October 20, 2007.</ref>

As it happened, the [[Cold War]] had an additional effect on the fair. President [[John F. Kennedy]] was supposed to attend the closing ceremony of the fair on October 21, 1962. He bowed out, pleading a "heavy cold"; it later became public that he was dealing with the [[Cuban Missile Crisis]].<ref>Greg Lange, [http://www.historylink.org/_output.CFM?file_ID=967 President Kennedy's Cold War cold supersedes Seattle World's Fair closing ceremonies on October 21, 1962], [[HistoryLink.org]] Essay 967, March 15, 1999. Accessed online October 18, 2007. {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20051122162319/http://www.historylink.org/_output.CFM?file_ID=967 |date=November 22, 2005 }}</ref>

The fair's vision of the future displayed a technologically based optimism that did not anticipate any dramatic social change, one rooted in the 1950s rather than in the cultural tides that would emerge in the 1960s. Affluence, automation, consumerism, and American power would grow; social equity would simply take care of itself on a rising tide of abundance; the human race would master nature through technology rather than view it in terms of ecology.<ref name=lesson25 /> In contrast, 12&nbsp;years later—even in far more conservative [[Spokane, Washington]]—[[Expo '74]] took environmentalism as its central theme. The theme of Spokane's Expo '74 was "Celebrating Tomorrow's Fresh New Environment.".<ref name=lesson26>[http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Pacific%20Northwest%20History/Lessons/Lesson%2026/26.html Lesson Twenty-six: Spokane's Expo '74: A World's Fair for the Environment] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20101222030759/http://www.washington.edu/uwired/outreach/cspn/Website/Classroom%20Materials/Pacific%20Northwest%20History/Lessons/Lesson%2026/26.html |date=December 22, 2010 }}, HSTAA 432: History of Washington State and the Pacific Northwest], Center for the Study of the Pacific Northwest, University of Washington. Accessed online April 9, 2011.</ref>