In accordance with the Chinese Zodiac calendar, 1958 was the Dog Year. In literature, Boris Pasternak, the 1958 Nobel Peace Prize for his novel won Doctor Zhivago But Aldous Huxley’s Valiente Nuevo Mundo It was the best -selling book. The film’s soundtrack South Pacific Finished the graphics while The bridge on the Quai River Seven Oscar won.
In sports, the FIFA World Cup final of 1958 resulted in Brazil by winning Sweden 5-2. Charly Gual of Luxembourg won the Tour de France. Closer to home, the European Economic Commission arose while Gaston Eyskens was re -elected for the second time as Belgium Prime Minister. But the event that most collective events of the encapsulated collective events are found in the Heys/Heys plateau in northwestern Brussels. April 17Th Exhibition😯 the 1958 World Fair in Brussels He opened a snapshot to the United States in the state of the world of the world. Let’s take a look …
Expo58 It was the First World Fair after World War II. The statement of the Mission of the Fair sought to show the most influential cultural, social and technological trends of a world that was recovering from the nightmare of World War II. More than forty nations had pavilions that emphasized their own national personality. For example, the exhibition “One day in Czechoslovakia” He intended to present his country a “beautiful dream.”
His organizers hoped to express a brighter tomorrow with solid ties with the past. This concept was a strange consultation, the hard -line communist regime of the 1950s. On the contrary, the Mexican Pavillion focused on its past with films, plays and choreographed musicals to represent specific periods of Mexican history.
Yugoslav organizers tried to delineate the Soviet Union symbolically showing their independent socioeconomic system. The design of its original pavilion was to create a modernist pavilion suspended in the air by a giant cable. When the concept was too expensive, reviews were made, but the symbolism was a count. However, there are no two pavilions defined more acutely than the Soviet pavilion when contrasting with US exposure.
In 1958, Europe was divided into opposite blocks led by the rival superpowers of the United States and the Soviet Union. Known as him Cold war This was an era of military, economic, ideological and cultural competence. Expo58 He offered an incomparable opportunity to propagandize their respective ideologies, that is, capitalism against communism, before an audience in Brussels, the heart of Europe.
The Soviets chose to demonstrate their considerable industrial and scientific progress. Upon entering the Soviet pavilion, Lenin’s statue and a Sputnik 1 and 2 model greeted the visitor. Soviet planners, not so subtly, occurred an official ideology (communism) with the latest Soviet technology and science achievements.
After the successful first satellite made by man to orbit the earth, that is, Sputnik I and Sputnik II-III-tuose 1957 The events were focal points in the Soviet pavilion. Full of a sound hemorrhage sound and the model of the cabin that took the dog Laika to space. There was also an exhibition about Soviet rocket technology with models not only of satellites but also its atomic reactor, and an ice groundbreaking with a nuclear engine. Collectively these exhibitions were presented as avant -garde achievements.
A Soviet exhibition organizer pointed out what the Soviets expected to achieve in Brussels:
“We have no other objective than to show the world what we are doing in the Soviet Union in contrast to the pleasure and excessive and comfortable Americans.”
The Soviet Vice Minister of Commerce, Ivan Bolshakov, took another step when he told the Brussels Planning Committee:
“Now that we have launched a satellite, Americans have begun to worry about winning them.”
Bolshakov’s observation would be likely to be apocryphal.
Directly in front of the Soviet pavilion was the vast exhibition of the United States. Its proximity was not an accident since the organizers of the fair expected to “organize” the tensions of the cold war side side by side. The United States pavilion, labeled by some like “The Pleasure Dome”, on the contrary, was dominated by the advertising of Madison Avenue that sought to show the “openness and opening of the American lifestyle.”
Fashion displeasure, men, sports equipment, leisure time products, convertible cars and early prototypes of a computer and color televisions dominated the pavilions. Coca-Cola, hamburgers and fashion ice cream were the choice soft drinks. The greatest attraction was the Pavillion Circo, then the largest circular building in the world, which housed a film room in the round system.
Circuma projected a film show on a 360 degree screen that allowed viewers to sit surrounded by the wonders of the US landscape. A Disney movie with Law America the beautiful He continually showed himself in a loop. The technological screens were minimal, but the icons of American life were front and central.
Capitalism vs. Communism, United States against the Soviet Union, capitalism versus communism, avant -garde Soviet technology versus complacency and comfort were extended metaphors for Expo 58s 40 million visitors. It is important to realize that the United States had no space achievements before Expo 58. The contrasts were marked and shocking, but the American establishment reacted quickly. In the immediate days to follow, President Eisenhower said:
“The United States needed to face the Soviet challenge with ingenuity and vigor.”
Later that year, the National Aeronautics and Space Law (NASA), a federal agency dedicated to space exploration was created. After some very public failures, the United States launched Explorer1 – Your first satellite mission. The National Aeronautics and Space Law (NASA), a federal agency dedicated to space exploration, was signed shortly after.
These events led to a space program that Project Mercury and Project Apollo followed and, by 1969, the United States had a man on the moon. What has been known as the Space race It had begun! It is undeniable that the genesis of competition between superpowers was due, in part to some 1958 exhibition pavilions in the Northwest Brussels.
Did you know?
– After Expo58 The only Yugoslave pavilion was sold and rebuilt as part of St. Paul’s College in the Belgian municipality of Wevelgem. He is still standing today.
—Real Madrid won the 3-2 European Cup on AC Milan at the Heysel Stadium, Brussels.
—Nins discussed in the Space race It is the fact that there were cooperative efforts between rival superpowers. His coronation achievement was 1975 Apolo-Soyuz project Wasby, a Soviet capsule, was a successful with the US Apollo module.
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