Building Bell System Pavillion (1964)

[Music] [Applause] mainly of people from all over the world have visited the New York World's [Music] Fair only 2 years before the fair opened the grounds were a desolate swampy tract called flushing meow on June 21st 1962 a group of officials gathered there on a 2 and 1/2 acre site for groundbreaking ceremonies at the future Bell System Pavilion there were Frederick kle AT&T board chairman Eugene J mcne president of AT&T hi romness president of Western Electric Clifton W faen president of the New York telephone company Robert M Moses president of the New York World's Fair and James W cook AT&T public relations vice president who would supervise the entire Project A Portrait of the future Pavilion was unveiled the first public glimpse of an outstanding architectural plan and a construction job equivalent in many ways to putting up a 40-story office building now the actual construction work Begins the deadline April 21st 1964 is tight considering the job to be done to make way for the foundation more than 500 truckloads of Earth are removed [Music] 1700 wood and steel piles are anchored deep in the ground to provide a solid footing for 2500 tons of structural steel the Great Frame will eventually rest on four pylons like this one the pylons in turn will rest on a foundation of 2500 y of concrete these steel men are among the first of a thousand men of various trades who will erect the Bell Pavilion every welding operation will be double checked by x-ray because of the extraordinary design of the structure March 1963 steel work is progressing rapidly on the 400t X 200t floating Wing Rising almost 100 ft into the air several months later the final shape of the structure is there an unusual one with celed wings stretching 108 ft beyond the pylon supports below is a building of comparable size the lower exhibition Hall being formed of reinforced [Music] concrete on the upper level 2400 ft of track will carry 1,000 spectator chairs in a continuous chain each chair equipped with its own audio system another Innovation is the steel reinforced fiberglass skin enclosing the entire upper structure 500 panels needing no paint quick to install and adding little weight by Midsummer the roof is [Music] off the topping off of Bill's 1ton microwave horn antenna is a big day at the construction site capable of handling 30 programs simultaneously the antenna serves as the official World's Fair television transmitter [Music] receiver it is the first transistorized microwave system at its base is a complete television control center by October 1963 the pavilion's exterior is far along toward completion meanwhile the fair is springing up all around the bill [Music] site the unisphere to become a permanent Landmark Travelers Pavilion the New York State Pavilion General [Music] Electric IBM the Electric Power and Light Company's Tower of [Music] Light the Bell System was one of the first to begin and its location proves to command the finest viewpoint on the Lagoon of Industry the entire job required the nation's top talents in the fields of architecture design construction Scenic production music Direction writing exhibits projection sound and electronics The Pavilion is divided into two levels each larger than a football field 880,000 Square ft of exhibit space the lower level is partially underground and will house a series of exhibits dramatizing Bell System activities in research manufacturing and customer services and products the upper level has a continuous chain of chairs designed to carry 39,00 Spectators daily through a theater in which the story of communications unfolds weather becomes a critical Factor as the deadline nears much of the building has to be done during an unusually severe winter sometimes it turns so bad outside work comes to a near standstill but inside Craftsmen with a great variety of skills are at work Scenic designers are putting the final touches on the Bell ride [Music] finale these men are wiring a globe that will demonstrate the immensely complex Communications network with animated patterns of [Music] light backstage 65 movie projectors along with large numbers of lighting effect effect machines make up the largest battery of visual effects equipment assembled in a single theatrical [Applause] show in the lower area exhibits are being assembled to show how the Bell System is meeting the communications needs of the nation through Science and Technology all of these will be seen by an audience of millions people will see and use the picture phone for the first time they will learn about electronic switching see machines that talk to other machines watch a Western Electric assembly operation and listen to the vocoder transform the human voice April 21st 1964 Mr cook congratulates the team responsible for getting the show ready and on time and assigns the happy task of opening the Pavilion to Mr kapple the whole operation and the demonstration here in every manner possible must be a reflection of the Ingenuity and the Enterprise of what I term free men and women and what they can produce in a free Society you're going to find people in all walks of life from many countries around the world and the preciousness of this freedom to operate in the free Society I hope can be demonstrated to the advantage of that way of life to all the people who come here with Mr faen and Marilyn vanderbur assisting Mr kapple personally greets the pavilion's first visitors and some of the 200 Bell System employees who will run the exhibits for the next 2 [Music] years two years in planning two more in building the Bell System Pavilion soon becomes a popular Landmark at the New York World's Fair a tribute to the lasting efforts of man to communicate with other men [Applause] [Music] [Music] and before our wide eyes so tomorrow our eyes fancied or real a ballad and steel Splendid and and Strong building a song of a world that is yet to come hammered and Mill welded and drilled rivets and Nails Timber and rails are ballet to skill to peace and good willll of a world that is on the way [Music] [Applause] high in the air over the fair watching the show down there below in splendor AR raay the world's on Parade seen from a holiday height from lands far away they walk on display East and the West the world at its best each tempted to stare at his friends of aair trying to understand the Exotic a new strolling in view learning to understand [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] aah [Music] peace through understanding that's the motto of Our Fair easily translated to any language anywhere a far away land seen close at hand the foreign the strange in peaceful exchange a colorful feast of sights from the east from lands far beyond the sea from lands where the rain be a ceaseless refrain where the Sun at midday bakes the mud into clay lands as ancient as man where story began and lands with a tale Just Begun traveling on to the lands of the Dawn where freedom is Hil to the beat of a festival drum [Music] go [Music] [Music] welc [Music] blades whirl around in a windmill of sound casting Shadows upon the tools of the future below then a slow blazing clim of the traveler in time and a portrait of space in the moon's CR face then AR rise in a days through a steel GED maze towards a symbol of Plenty for all [Music] all of our [Music] we are now coming to the beautiful Bell System Pavilion where you'll see the story of communications as you ride in a comfortable looking for dreams someday we may own walking to wers the strange the unknown waiting on lines till the moment is ours when we'll Taste of the future rejoice in its powers the patterns you see on these television screens are pictur of sounds this machine is called a vocoder it is used for analyzing a speaker's voice while he is talking I have now adusted the voder electronic switching is almost like magic it will bring you telephone services never before thought possible someday people may want to see as well as talk over the telephone what we are doing here is trying out one model of a picture phone a new dimension in telephoning in a place where electronic wonders abound a marriage of sight to the drama of sound a wonderful coupling of vision and speech then a ride to the Future and the past Within Reach and now all are welcome on the Bell System ride you know this ride you're taking never ends at least the story it tells never ends it's the story of man against time and distance The NeverEnding Human Adventure of man's need to communicate the story is a search for Secrets buried deep in nature long before time Secrets magical enough to make mountains deserts oceans vanish but only a moment ago as nature tells time in the ancient Wilderness the sound of man was only man's [Music] size because you must you invent a language that talks louder than your loudest shout words carved with a chisel you have Shrunk the world you achieve the Marvel of the written word words to be sent only as far and as fast as two feet can carry them but handmade words take too long so you make words by Machine pressed into paper printed into books knowledge you can send anywhere [Music] everywhere and still another language the language of plus and minus and equals numbers mathematics which can take the measure of the world but you learn to read the language of nature's laws you invent science gravity magnetism light and you teach electricity to speak speak Alexander Graham Bell's seven simple words Mr Watson come here I want you from these seven words have grown the telephone nerve system of our nation a living network which mirrors the Ingenuity and Enterprise of free men in a free Society yes you have the world at your fingertips but you can't help reaching for tomorrow up to tellar and Beyond and this is only part of what you'll see at the Bell System ride [Music] [Applause] [Music] n [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] go [Music] and here is the largest most ferocious monster of all times Tyrannosaurus the Tyrant lizard with his great jaws and teeth he attacked every living creature in sight [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] and before our wide eyes so tomorrow arise fancied or real a ballad and steel Splendid and Strong building a song of a world that is on the way as the day and its light turns into Night Lights fading on are the Harrows of dawn of a dawn dreamed of still with peace and good willll of a world that is on the [Music] way I