Expo 67

The 1967 International and Universal Exposition, or simply Expo 67 was a World's Fair held in Montreal, Quebec, Canada in 1967 to coincide with the Canadian Centennial that year. Expo 67 was originally going to be held in Moscow, to help the Soviet Union celebrate the 50th anniversary of its revolution.

History

Background

The idea of hosting the 1967 World's Fair dates back to 1956. But it was in 1958 when the Conservative Senator Mark Drouin pushed for the exhibition that the idea of hosting a fair to celebrate Canada's centennial began to take shape. Initially offered to Toronto, politicians there rejected the idea, yet Montreal mayor Sarto Fournier backed the proposal. But Canada lost out to Moscow when that city was awarded the fair by the International Bureau of Expositions (B.I.E.). In 1962 the Soviets scrapped plans to host the fair due to financial constraints. New Montreal city mayor Jean Drapeau lobbied the Canadian government to try again for the fair, which they did. On November 15th 1962 the B.I.E. changed the location of the World's fair to Canada, and the resulting Expo '67 became the Western Hemisphere's first official World's Fair since the B.I.E. was established in 1928.

The original proposed site was to be Mount Royal Park, to the north of the downtown core (See "Did You Know"). It was Drapeau's idea to create new islands in the St. Lawrence river, along with using Saint Helen's Island.

But things didn't get off to a smooth start when in 1963 many top organizing committee officials resigned. One of the reasons for the resignations was a computer program predicted that the event couldn't possibly be constructed in time. (see CBC Televison video clip)

Construction started on August 13, 1963. With the master plan was officially submitted on December 23, 1963. And the land itself wasn't officially handed over to Montreal until June 30, 1964. Ile Notre-Dame, an artificial island was built from earth excavated for the Montreal metro system (which was under construction at the same time).

The theme, "Man and his World" was based on the 1939 book titled: "Terre des Hommes (Wind, Sand and Stars)" by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. The organizers also created seven sub-themes: Man in the Community, Man the Creator, Man the Explorer, Man the Producer, Man the Provider, Habitat67 and Labyrinth.

The fair

Expo 67 opened on April 28, 1967. An estimated 315,000 visitors showed up for opening day, with only 120,000 people expected. The first person through the Expo gates was Al Carter from Chicago who had waited in line for more than 24 hours. Over 1000 reporters covered the event, which was broadcast live via satellite to a world wide audience of over 700,000,000 viewers and listeners. The fair was officially opened by Governor General Roland Michener (Who was sworn in just 10 days earlier following the death of Georges Vanier) who along with the Prime Minister of Canada, Lester B. Pearson lit the Expo torch. On hand were over 7,000 invited guests including 53 heads of state.

Expo featured 90 pavilions for nations, corporations and industries including the U.S. pavilion, a geodesic dome designed by Buckminster Fuller. Expo 67 also featured the Habitat 67 housing complex designed by architect Moshe Safdie, which is still occupied. The Golden Centennaires also performed at expo.

A notable feature of Expo 67 was the World Festival of Entertainment, featuring opera, ballet and theatre companies, alongside orchestras, jazz groups, famous Canadian pop musicians and other cultural attractions.

The Expo was one of the most successful World's Fairs and is still regarded fondly by Canadians. Some even consider it to be one of the biggest events of the 20th century. 1967 is often referred to as "the last good year" before economic decline, Quebec sovereigntism (seen as negative from a federalist viewpoint), and political apathy became common. Despite this there were problems: FLQ terrorists were active at the time and death threats were issued. American President Lyndon B. Johnson's visit became a focus of anti-war protesters.

More than 50 million visitors (50,306,648) attended Expo 67 at a time when Canada's population was only 20 million, setting a record for World Fair attendance that still stands. The fair was visited by many of the most notable people of the day including Queen Elizabeth II, Lyndon Johnson, Princess Grace, Jacqueline Kennedy, and Charles de Gaulle, who created an international controversy when he shouted "Vive le Québec libre!" ("Long Live Free Quebec") from the balcony of Montreal city hall on July 24 (this slogan being well known as the rallying cry of the Quebec independentists).

Logo

Expo '67 logo designed by Julien Hébert

The logo was designed by Montreal artist Julien Hébert. The basic unit of the logo is an ancient symbol of man. Two of the symbols are linked as to represent friendship. The icon was put into a circle as to represent 'friendship around the world'. The font for the text is lower-case bold-face, Optima font.

Theme songs

The official Expo 67 Theme Song was composed by Stephane Venne and was titled: "Hey Friend, Say Friend / Un Jour, Un Jour". Complaints were made about the suitablity of the song as lyrics neither mention Montreal or Expo '67. The song was selected from an international competition. Over 2,200 entries from 35 countries were made.

But the song that most Canadians associate with Expo was written by Bobby Gimby, a veteran commercial jingle writer who wrote the popular Expo tune "Ca-na-da", which went on to sell over 500,000 copies. Gimby earned the name the "Pied Piper of Canada". The musical score of the song was composed by Ben McPeek, who also created the music played in the Canadian Pulp and Paper Industry pavilion. In 1971, Gimby granted all future royalties to the Boy Scouts of Canada.

The theme song Something to Sing was used for the Canadian Pavilion, was initially written for a 1963 television special.

The Ontario pavilion also had its own theme song: "A Place to Stand, A Place to Grow"

Pavilions

National pavilions

The West Germany Pavilion designed by Frei Otto

• Canada Pavilion (Expo 67) - The distinctive building comprised of a large inverted pyramid called the Katimavik, which is the Inuit word for "Gathering Place". The pavilion was located on a 30,285 sq metre lot. The major attractions in the building included The Land of Canada, The Growth of Canada and The Challenge to Canadians and Canada and the World.
• Cuba
• Czechoslovakia
• France
• Greece
• India
• Iran
• Israel
• Italy
• Poland
• West Germany Pavilion (Expo 67)(FRG) (designed by Frei Otto, who also worked on the design of the Japanese Pavilion at Expo 2000)
• Africa Place
• United Kingdom Pavilion (Expo 67)
• Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Pavilion(USSR)
• United States of America Pavilion - designed by Buckminster Fuller, the pavilion was one of the most popular with over 5 million visits. The building was distinguished by its large 20 story geodesic dome with an acrylic skin (which caught fire and melted away in 1972). The site minirail train passed through the building. The six floors were based on the theme of: "Creative America - the positive use of creative energy". The exhibits included everything from Elvis Presley's guitar to Apollo spacecraft. But not everyone liked the pavilion including U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson (who after a brief visit) was alleged to have said "the homosexuals have had carte blanche!" in reference to the design and content of the displays.

Regional pavilions

Expo 67 - Ontario Pavilion, with the Canadian Pavilion in the background.

• Ontario - The pavilion contained 16 bilingual exhibits, a 570 seat circular (66 x 30 foot screen) theatre which played a 16-minute multi-image film and a large restaurant complex. The movie include the song "A Place to Stand, A Place to Grow" which became the unofficial theme song for Ontario.
• Quebec
• Atlantic Provinces - Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland shared the same pavilion building.
• Western Provinces - Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia all shared the same building space.

• Vermont

Thematic pavilions

• Man and His World
• Man the Producer
• Man and the Arctic
• Man and the Ocean
• Indians of Canada - A pavilion devoted to the aboriginals of Canada. It was one of the most controversial buildings as it included photos and works of art that depicted the difficulties faced by Aboriginals in Canada (such as on reserves, and issues raised with the use of Residential schools). It showcased the plight of natives before and after the arrival of Europeans, and explained at length how European settlers needed the aid of aboriginals in order to survive the harsh winters in Canada.

Industrial pavilions

Canadian Pulp and Paper Industry Pavilion

• Alcan
• Bell Canada
• Canadian Pulp and Paper Pavilion - 44 stylized tree tops created the unique roof, the tallest tree reaching 8 stories. Out front guests were greeted by a stylized sculpture of a roll of paper being unwound. The sculpture had the attached meaning of: "(paper) the principal tool Man uses to record his thoughts". The trees were constructed with tongue and groove Douglas fir plywood (19mm) over a steel frame. All of the trees had the same 4.9 m² base, but the height varied from 5 to 18m. The plywood was coated with various shades of green epoxy paints. Over 9,300 m² of plywood was used to build the roof.
• Air Canada
• Telephone Pavilion - The main attraction of the film was the Walt Disney Circle-Vision 360 film: "Canada 67" - (From Expo'67 Guide book): "You're on centre stage for the RCMP Musical Ride... on centre ice for hockey... on the track at the Stampede! CIRCLE-VISION 360 surrounds you with all the fun and excitement of Canada's most thrilling events and its scenic beauty. And then, take your chldren to the Enchanted Forest...see exciting new communication services for the future... all in the Telephone Pavilion!" (source page 178 Official Expo 67 guide book. Maclean-Hunter Publishing Co. Ltd.)

Facts and figures

Record album cover for the official theme song

• All figures in 1967 values and in Canadian funds:
  • Cost: $431,904,683
  • Revenue: $221,239,872
    today worth $1.768 billion
  • Deficit: $210,664,811
  • Chief Architect: M. Edouard Fiset (and Jerry Miller, senior assistant architect)
• Participating Countries:
  • Africa: Algeria, Cameroun, Chad, Congo, Ivory Coast, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Kenya, Madagascar, Morocco, Mauritius, Niger, Rwanda, Senegal, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, and Upper Volta
  • Asia: Burma, Ceylon, China (Taiwan), Korea, India, Iran, Israel, Japan, Thailand and the United Arab Republic
  • Australia
  • Europe: Austria, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Denmark, Finland, France, Federal Republic of Germany, Greece, Iceland, Italy, Monaco, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom, the USSR, and Yugoslavia
  • Latin America: Barbados, Cuba, Grenade, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and Venezuela
  • North America: Canada, Mexico, and the United States
  • Absent countries included The People's Republic of China, Spain, South Africa, and many countries of South America.

• The band They Might Be Giants referenced Expo '67 in their song Purple Toupee

• Bowser and Blue wrote a full length musical set at Expo 67 called "The Paris of America" which ran for 6 sold out weeks at the Centaur theatre in Montreal in April and May of 2003.

• On opening day, there was considerable comment on the uniform of the hostesses from the UK Pavilion. The dresses had been designed to the then new minidress style, which had been introduced in the previous year by Mary Quant. By the middle of the summer, nearly every other pavilion had raised the hem of the uniforms of their hostesses. Canadian women were quick to take to the liberated style of the mini skirt.

• With the closure of Expo 67, the exhibition site on Saint Helen's Island was used during the next and several following years as an attraction called "Man & His World" (which was the sub-title of Expo 67). The Montreal Metro (Underground railway) was opened in time for Expo 67, and included a station on St Helen's island to give public transport to the exhibition. This resulted in Montrealers having easy access to the park on the island after all of the other attractions had closed.

• The television show Battlestar Galactica used the Expo grounds as a backdrop in the episode "Greetings from Earth" in 1979. In the show viewers can see what was left of the French, British and American pavilions.

• The Robert Altman movie Quintet was filmed during winter on the Expo site; most scenes took place in the ruins of the Man the producer theme pavilions.

Legacy

The only buildings remaining in use on the Expo grounds are the Buckminister Fuller dome (now operating as a museum called Biosphère) and the Habitat '67 residences. Also, the French and Quebec pavilions are now part of the Montreal Casino. The Jamaican Pavillion is still standing, and the Place des Nations is also. There are several other remains, such as lampposts and landscaping, and the rapid transit subway system still has at least one "Man and His World" logo on a station's wall.

Montreal's former baseball team, the Expos, was named after the event. The United Nations Postal Administration issued stamps in local currency for use at the Fair.

Crowds in front of the Quebec pavilion.

After 1967, the site struggled on for years as a standing collection of international pavilions known as "Man and His World." However, as attendance declined, the physical condition of the site deteriorated, and less and less of it was open to the public. In 1975 the Île Notre-Dame section of the site was completely rebuilt around the new rowing basin for Montreal's 1976 Summer Olympics. Space for the basin, the boathouses, the changing rooms and other buildings was obtained by demolishing many of the former pavilions and cutting in half the area taken by the artificial lake and the canals. In 1972, a fire destroyed the acrylic outer skin of Buckminster Fuller's dome. With the site falling into disrepair it began to resemble ruins of a futuristic city. In the late 70s, scenes for Robert Altman's post-apocalyptic ice age Quintet were shot on site, as was an episode of Battlestar Galactica, which portrayed it as the ruins of a city left behind after a biological attack. Some of the footage showing the United Kingdom pavilion was reused in Buck Rogers. The remaining original exhibits of the site closed for good in 1982.

Today, the site houses the Montreal Casino (in the former pavilions of France and Quebec), the Circuit Gilles Villeneuve race track, an amusement park called La Ronde, and many acres of parkland and cycle paths on Ile Saint-Helene and the western tip of Ile Notre-Dame. The old US pavilion still stands, currently housing a science museum on the theme of nature (the Biosphère). On Ile Notre-Dame the Olympic basin is used by many rowing clubs of the area. In summer, an artificial beach, recently built on the shore of the remaining artificial lake, has been very popular. In previous years the site has been used for a number of events such as an international botanical festival, Les floralies. The young trees and shrubs planted for Expo 67 are now mature. The plants introduced during the botanical events have prospered also. In the warmest weeks of the summer the two islands are cool, leafy havens compared to the overheated city. In the winter, brave Montrealers skate on the frozen Olympic basin of Île Notre-Dame, whipped by the glacial winds coming from the Saint Lawrence River.

In a cultural context Expo '67 was seen as a landmark moment in Canadian history. As the Montreal Star described it: "the most staggering Canadian achievement since this vast land was finally linked by a transcontinental railway". It would also be the year that Quebec's relationship with the rest of Canada would begin to change forever. Invited Expo guest Charles De Gaulle on July 24th addressed thousands at Montreal City Hall by yelling out the now famous words of: "Vive Montréal... Vive le Québec ...Vive le Québec Libre!" (See Vive le Québec libre speech). To be later rebutted by Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson: "Canadians do not need to be liberated, Canada will remain united and will reject any effort to destroy her unity". In the years that followed the divide between the English and French communities would continue to grow. The 1969 bombing of the Montreal Stock Exchange by the Front de libération du Québec, the 1970 FLQ Crisis and the Quebec referendum were all major events that were just around the corner.

Expo '67 in many ways marked the peak of Montreal as a city, Canadian confederation and national harmony.

Films and books

• Canadian Experience - Expo 67: Back to the Future (DVD) - A recently made documentary film taking viewers back to Expo 67. Made by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, includes archival footage of the fair, including construction and opening ceremonies.

See also

• A Place to Stand, A Place to Grow
• A Centennial Song
• 1967 in Canada
• 1976 Summer Olympics, also held in Montreal.
• Expo '86, held in Vancouver
• Ontario Place, a Toronto park created in the 1970s to mimic Expo '67.
• Annual Canadian expos the Canadian National Exhibition and Pacific National Exhibition

External links

• Expo 67 - In pictures, from the website of
• Expo 67 in Montreal
• Expo 67 - A Virtual Experience, from the website of Library and Archives Canada
• Expo 67 postcard gallery
• CBC Digital Archives - Expo 67: Montreal Welcomes the World
• Expo 67 in photos - www.worldsfairphotos.com
• Usage of wood at Expo 67

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