The Bicentennial Blues
MEYER, EUGENE L.
WHERE ARE WE NOW? The Bicentennial Blues BY EUGENE L. MEYER Anniversaries are by nature artificial, contrived affairs. What makes them seem real is something tangible—a gift, a card, a...
...We're just not going to get this thing together with any-other vehicle...
...Withdraw it from the market, but give everyone in the market area, including your stockholders, a better product to take its place...
...It is, more importantly, the fact that world's fairs are, almost by definition, obsolete...
...Jack I. LeVant...
...The same with the British and the French...
...ARBC Chairman David J. Ma-honey, a former chief executive officer of Norton Simon, Inc., who had earned his stripes by working in Nixon's 1960 campaign and contributing at least $3,000 to the President's 1968 warchest, called together his executive committee...
...Stymied by its inability to find a suitable location, the city made little progress in its preparations for Expo 76...
...The wisdom of the decision to kill the Expo will undoubtably be debated for years to come, as we muddle through our Bicentennial wondering what it is all about and why we cannot feel and touch it...
...All of those companies could have a vested interest or a real tangible foothold in our project...
...They reveal that the American Revolution Bicentennial Commission (ARBC), created by Congress in 1966, with most of the original members replaced by President Nixon soon after he took office, first turned down Philadelphia's proposal in June 1970...
...The reaction from most quarters was less than enthusiastic...
...It could bo a real impressive project...
...a one-time Madison Avenue whiz kid, its memo continued: "If you have a product market tested for seven years at a cost to the corporation of $3.5 million and still no one would buy it—what do you do if it eventually will affect the corporation's stock and public image...
...But nobody knows yet what form the event will take...
...At that time the ARBC explained its decision as follows: "Number one, the traditional international exposition would unavoidably focus national and international attention and interest on one city, whereas the Commission sees its responsibility as preserving and protecting the national aspects of the Bicentennial, as stipulated in its guidelines...
...I can advise you that there is every probability of a satisfactory solution," he said...
...They don't care whether it is Philadelphia or an alternative program but there must be a program...
...Today, in America, it would be exploitative and irrelevant...
...And there is no evidence that Nelson tried to discredit the parks plan at the April 20 meeting...
...Mahoney's reply, which he also read, was noncommittal...
...What makes them seem real is something tangible—a gift, a card, a celebration, a mourning candle...
...Rizzo's site committee finally settled on a piece of marsh next to the airport...
...It isn't only that we have had our fill of Expos...
...president of the Philadelphia 1976 Bicentennial Corporation, wrote Stans and Mahoney that final approval of a new site was expected March 25...
...Again the main site was to be Philadelphia, perhaps with coordinated festivities in Boston, Washington and Miami...
...No politician ever gets reelected by killing the goose that lays the golden egg...
...Then the chairman presented a second Philadelphia letter: "United States Embassy officials in Paris are greatly concerned about any delay and confirm the credibility gap which would result...
...Work on that "better product"— the Bicentennial Parks—had in fact been proceeding under a shroud of secrecy...
...The location had been considered and rejected before because of environmental problems, but it was the only one that aroused no vocal citizen opposition...
...But the script had already been written...
...This was Philadelphia's final humiliation in its 15-year effort to host the nation's Bicentennial...
...The most ringing endorsement came from Publisher James Copley, chairman of ARBC's communications committee, who congratulated Mahoney for "a bold move that has gotten the Bicentennial off dead center...
...According to the transcript, all he said was that the Eastwick site "is a lot better than we thought at the outset...
...In language designed to appeal to Mahoney...
...Afterward, Mayor Rizzo asked the Commerce Department for a $1.8 million "rebate" for city money spent in planning the fair...
...Tennyson [the Common Market public information officer] impolitely interrupted to ask why we were showing the Bicentennial Parks model to foreign governments before the Philadelphia question had been decided...
...Several commissioners complained bitterly that they had been left out of the decision-making process and that the release was premature...
...Nelson recently reflected...
...The President would like this," he said...
...In 1876, an American traditional exposition was a fitting expression of a young nation's pride in accomplishments...
...George Lang, a Hungarian-born New York restauran-teur who is chairman of Festival USA, as the celebrational part of the commemoration is called, had already told the other commissioners: "With all due respect for Montreal and Osaka, nobody in his right mind would want to see our impending Bicentennial end up as Expo 76, whether in Philadelphia, Boston, Washington, or some improbable place like Miami Beach, wherever that may be...
...They are accustomed to participating in international expositions but on the other hand there is evidence that they are becoming disillusioned about the effectiveness of international expositions...
...Senator Hugh Scott, who got President Nixon to commit to the Expo...
...On September 1, Mahoney wrote Maurice Stans, then Secretary of Commerce: "The risk of failure of an international exposition may be acceptable when such an exposition is staged alone...
...Bicentennial program director, advised that in any event the Commission's parks plan should not be made public until sites were located, and cost and legislative problems were pinned down...
...They are at opposite ends of the world...
...The city's boosters saw it as a challenge...
...Nonetheless, the Commission sat back a year while Philadelphians considered and rejected a seemingly endless series of site recommendations that led from 30th Street Station to Byberry to Eastwick, with other whistlestops in-between...
...I would like to take him on myself...
...We are informed by the banking leaders in Philadelphia that their commitment to raise $3 million in interim financing would have to be withdrawn if approval of the Philadelphia proposal is delayed too long...
...Perhaps to counter Nelson's thrusts, Mahoney has maintained publicly that the two proposals arc not in competition with each other...
...he wrote LeVant on January 13, "I have been concerned since at least July 1970 about the confusion in the international community over the whole question of participation in the Bicentennial...
...Besides maintaining official silence on its anti-Expo stand, R. Lynn Carroll...
...who ran and was elected mayor on the basis of no new taxes...
...At the end of the meeting, Mahoney said, "I think we have come up with a solid wedge we can stand behind...
...R-Md...
...But on February 2, while Commission members were still maintaining official neutrality, the scenario for the demise of the Philadelphia Expo was detailed in a staff memorandum to Mahoney: "It should be clear beyond any doubts that Philadelphia will not kill the Expo...
...He said this was very confusing to foreign governments and might decrease interest in Philadelphia...
...Mahoney agreed, explaining that the ARBC had "stayed out" so as not to rain on Philadelphia's "parade...
...In less than a month, however, the Commission backed away from open opposition...
...In an age of instant communication between the moon and the wrist telephone you will be wearing in 1976, the idea of having people line up for endless hours to be permitted to observe a boring display out of choice obviously is idiotic...
...By August 1971 the Commission's patience was wearing thin...
...In my view, Nelson would be quite prepared to pass along information he gets from us to Dingwall or diplomatic friends of his who are exposition oriented...
...A career bureaucrat with a heavy Boston accent, he is Director of the Division of Trade Fairs and Expositions at Commerce...
...The response of the state commissions was mixed, ranging from enthusiasm on the West Coast to coolness in the East...
...It was played out by the executive committee, which tentatively rejected the fair as too expensive, and the full Commission, which voted overwhelmingly to scuttle Expo at its May 16 meeting in Boston...
...officially withdrew its application for the Philadelphia Expo from the BIE...
...Steel in another state...
...Face saving is needed for the following: President Nixon, who committed the ARBC and the country to an Expo in Philadelphia...
...But something funny happened on the way to the fair, and the 1976 Expo was quietly killed...
...Philadelphia will continue to grasp at straws, an exercise in which she is engaged at this very moment, seizing on plans which have already been rejected in the past because of problems of ecology, transportation, etc...
...hardly reconciled to an international exposition...
...Philadelphia has had one champion inside the ARBC executive committee, J. William Nelson, the representative of the Commerce Department...
...Mahoney also implied that the Commission had endorsed the Bicentennial Parks when, in truth, it had only passed a watered-down resolution saying that the idea was worthy of further study...
...A prototype model had already been shown to a select group including White House aide William Satire, who suggested that an athletic facility be incorporated in each park...
...With TV cameras rolling, Mahoney unveiled the parks plan and revealed that Congress would be expected to foot the $1.2 billion cost...
...There is a heritage...
...I am convinced that Tennyson's presence was inspired by either Bill Nelson or Ewing Dingwall [a consultant to Philadelphia...
...For reasons of prestige, the Executive Rranch cannot allow Philadelphia to continue to dangle it on a string...
...The next day William L. Rat'sky...
...Meanwhile, Philadelphia picked yet another site, and the ARBC came under attack from Senator Charles McC...
...The Russians told me they were very disappointed...
...Commission officials view him as an enemy out to save the Expo and sabotage the Bicentennial Parks...
...He announced his intention to tell the Administration that "a substantial majority of our Commission members are opposed to the proposed international exposition in Philadelphia," that "this matter has been under Commission study for almost two years," and that "the time is now near for a decision to resolve this issue...
...While visions of Bicentennial Parks danced in the Commission's head, Philadelphia had not given up...
...Federal and state commissions have been appointed, countless meetings have been held, millions of dollars have been spent...
...Blue added, "I'm quite convinced about Bill Nelson's campaign against the Bicentennial Parks scheme and I foresee the possibility that he will try to use the executive committee meeting on April 20 to discredit the plan as being a substitute for Philadelphia...
...I'm the enemy anytime 1 say follow through a logical procedure," he contends...
...It is not acceptable, however, when the exposition is firmly tied to the entire nationwide Bicentennial effort...
...The coffin was nailed shut in Paris on May 25 when the U.S...
...And John Ehrlichman, Nixon's assistant for domestic affairs, had been invited to a private briefing...
...On May 1, Nelson submitted the Commerce Department's final recommendation...
...Blue recommended that the Commission immediately withdraw its support for an international Expo in Philadelphia...
...Supportive Federal legislation will take time and should be introduced early this summer to maintain construction and development schedules...
...Later that month, Mahoney told his executive committee that he had called General Motors executives and "all of them think we are the Philadelphia Bicentennial...
...Indeed, the postmortems have already begun: "We're going to be very regretful the Exposition went down the drain...
...I think I can best describe his attitude as being dogmatic, creating turmoil, and using power with . . . those who bow to his wishes...
...Several months later, the city did receive a White House promise of Federal grants for a scaled-down celebration, but nothing that approaches the size of an Expo...
...LeVant, in a January 25 "eyes only" letter to Ma-honey, concurred: "Administration reversal of the ARBC decision on the Philadelphia Exposition in June of 1970 and the lack of direction since then have caused embarrassment and confusion at home and abroad and have created a time-consuming, unproductive monster that is still with us overshadowing all other Bicentennial efforts...
...Governor Shapp, who doesn't want to be known as the governor who lost the chance to save his state by hosting an Expo: Mayor Rizzo...
...It was looking hopefully to Petty's Island in the Delaware River and Port Richmond, a white ethnic neighborhood across the way...
...Congressmen snickered at the price tag...
...As we are all aware, the 200th anniversary of the United States is coming up in 1976...
...A meeting of all the state Bicentennial commissions to be held at the Washington Hilton on February 22, it was decided, would be the proper place to launch an offensive...
...Then Philadelphia Mayor Frank L. Rizzo, reacting to fears expressed by Port Richmond residents, killed the proposal...
...It was long thought the Bicentennial event would be a world's fair in the tradition of the 1876 Centennial and the 1926 Sesquicen-tennial...
...From a political standpoint, some major PR push was needed to offset criticism of ARBC as a do-nothing group...
...But the extent to which they are is clear from a memorandum from Blue to LeVant, describing the showing of the parks plan to Guy Vanhaeverbeke of the Common Market: "As soon as the presentation was finished, the discussion turned to Philadelphia and the Dutch Minister asked me what the status of Philadelphia was at this time...
...Previously wrapped in secrecy, the documents detailing the inside story of how we arrived at our present confused state of affairs have only recently come to light...
...as potential Expo sites...
...At that meeting Mahoney read a letter from John Bunting and Rafsky asking that the ARBC executive committee make its recommendations to President Nixon so that a decision could be reached in time for the important May meetings of the Bureau of International Expositions (BIE) in Paris...
...President Nixon extended Philadelphia a half-hearted invitation to see if it could put together a plan that would work...
...A $150,000 feasibility study late last year then raised serious questions about the practically of the whole scheme, still in limbo as of this writing...
...LeVant, agreeing, wrote Mahoney with alarm: "In my book . . . 'Nelson must go.' He cannot work for Expo and for the Bicentennial...
...Blue later reported to LeVant that Nelson had phoned and "politely but nonetheless firmly berated me for arranging to have the parks model shown to foreign diplomats...
...Nelson rejects the Commission's view of him as saboteur par excellence...
...For the last several years, Americans have been groping for an appropriate way to commemorate the Bicentennial...
...Commerce replied that no funds were available and no procedure or precedent existed for such a Federal grant...
...By January 1972...
...Under pressure from Pennsylvania's Hugh Scott, the Senate minority leader...
...William L. Blue, ARBC's director of international affairs, saw it as an albatross dangling from the Commission's neck...
...Foreign embassies in Washington and foreign governments overseas have demonstrated in my view great interest in the Bicentennial but they must have something to focus on...
...It could be called a General Motors Building in one state, a Chrysler Building in another state, U.S...
...It has always been possible in the past to explain to foreign governments that the Philadelphia plan was pending, but we are reaching the point of no return...
...Mathias Jr...
...It was suggested this was because the Commission had put forth no program of its own...
...Number two, the Commission senses that it is the national will to forego the expense and the all too often superficial aspects of an international exposition, and instead to channel the investments in time and money into more meaningful and rewarding endeavors...
...The ARBC's opposition to Expo, the staff cautioned, should not be pressed until all officials can gracefully back off...
...As you know...
...It supported the Expo with many qualifications, the main one being the need for substantial monetary and other support from the Federal government...
...Mahoney's Bicentennial director and a former business associate at Colgate-Palmolive, was equally enthusiastic: "I think we can raise from the private sector anywhere from $500 million to $1 billion...
...the man largely responsible for its creation in 1966...
...Stans, keeping the door open for a world's fair, told Mahoney that no final decision should be made until a study of the new sites was completed...
...As an alternative to an Expo, the Commission staff submitted a plan for 50 Bicentennial Parks of 100-500 acres, one in each state...
...The attitude of Maine Governor Kenneth Curtis, according to an ARBC staff memorandum, "was one of mirth...
...But the ARBC was Eugene L. Meyer is urban affairs reporter for the Washington Post...
Vol. 56 • April 1973 • No. 9
