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I know it’s been mentioned and discussed here on WFC a number of times over the years. But Eater New York currently has a feature on their Instagram page about Mario Costa, the owner and operator of White Mana Diner in Jersey City, which is a surviving relic from the 1939-40 New York World’s Fair. And here’s a link to the entire post (with additional photos and video ) if you’re on Instagram. White Mana Diner / Eater NY on Instagram

What’s the deal with the ceiling made of hats?

Yep. I saw them right away! Do you suppose that instead of thousands of nuns visiting the Fair, there were only two who, just as a remarkable fluke, show up in every photo?

Looks like a movie location to me! Unisphere - check Fountains - check Luminaires - check Trees - check Escorter - check Benches and trash cans - check Crowds in distance - check Extras with action? Family with kids, middle aged couple, bench sitters ? - check check check Wait, where are the nuns? - Oh - check!

Newly restored slide from 1964.

Happy Anniversary Bill & Mrs. 🙂

Happy Anniversary to you and Carol!

Thanks, Wayne! It's also my 41st wedding anniversary so a big day for the boy of Irish descent to celebrate!

Yeah, how much could a few more nails have cost?

Tomorrow's presentation for the Adventure Club of New York will be the Industrial Area of the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair. This section had two big Disney shows (General Electric and Pepsi's "Small World"), other major pavilions such as IBM, Coca-Cola, and Du Pont, and one exhibitor that proudly proclaimed itself as the smallest pavilion at the Fair (until an even smaller one came along in 1965! The talk begins at 8 PM Eastern time. Tickets are available at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-1964-65-new-york-worlds-fair-part-3-industrial-area-webinar-registration-1234781888869?aff=billc. If you can't make it live the series is available for replay until one week after Part 5.

That’s just pathetic.

By September 1965 it was looking quite shabby. Newly restored 35mm slide.

Newly restored 35mm slide.

I love those paintings. If I recall, I saw them in Salt Lake City ~12 years ago at their visitor's center during my trip around the US one summer. HUGE and rich in vibrant colors and detail for great story telling.

Newly restored 35mm slide

I just finished picking out the photos for tomorrows talk on the International Area at the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair. I had even more of them than I thought! The talk begins Thursday at 8 PM Eastern time. https://www.nyadventureclub.com/event/the-1964-65-new-york-worlds-fair-part-2-international-area-webinar-registration-1234776603059/

I will be giving an online 5-part lecture series on the 1964-1965 New York World's Fair for the Adventure Club of New York. Each week will be a deep dive into one of the Fair's themed areas. The program starts this week with the Federal & State Area. Each talk begins at 8 PM Eastern time on Thursday. Replays are available online for one week after the series ends. Registration is at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-1964-65-new-york-worlds-fair-part-1-federal-state-areas-webinar-registration-1234759552059?aff=billc Please join me for a trip back in time to the days of "Peace Through Understanding."

Thanks, Craig. I have a copy of that and will dig it out!

Great find Craig!

Yeah I side with Moses there. Really glad this wasn't chosen.

The following Fair Corporation report issued on 12/5/60 contains a sketch and floor plan map of the domed version of the U.S. Pavilion. NEW YORK WORLD'S FAIR 1964 - 1965 CORPORATION INTERIM REPORT OF THE EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE OF THE FAIR TO THE PRESIDENT AND CONGRESS OF THE UNITED STATES SUGGESTING FOR CONSIDERATION A PLAN FOR A PERMANENT FRANKLIN NATIONAL CENTER OF SCIENCE AND EDUCATION TO HOUSE THE UNITED STATES EXHIBIT AT THE FAIR There is also a number of photos and details about Portland Cements proposal for the ‘“Galaxon” theme center for the fair at this link. https://www.paulrudolph.institute/196010-galaxon

I read the linked page, and what GIMP provides are the same tools as Photoshop. Like Photoshop, it does not have the capability of the digital ROC plugin. The problem with restoring badly faded to pink slides is this: An unfaded slide when scanned has a predictable percentage of crosstalk between the red, green and blue channels (or equivalently the cyan, magenta, and yellow dyes). The scanner color analysis nominally takes this into account by itself. Color casts due to lighting or the differences between film brands are slight enough to be corrected by the tools in Gimp or Photoshop. A badly faded pink slide, however, has the original cross talk of the magenta dye (green channel) into the other two channels, so just increasing the contrast in those channels to recover the original dye density also increases the amount of crosstalk component. Digital ROC apparently has a very good model of this crosstalk and subtracts it somehow from the channels where it doesn't belong. There is no tool in GIMP or Photoshop that does this manually or automatically with such great success.

I have found that GIMP, while not fully automated and polished, is POWERFUL with its toolsets and really gives users what they're looking for with a little experimentation. Have you played around with it? I tend to view learning a newer tool that does what a favorite old one does that hasn't been updated, is like using a different car. You're used to everything your favorite car does and the dashboard, the new one is a different manufacturer and model with a different dashboard. Both do the same jobs, drive from point a to b, has windshield wipers, and radio, and dashcams, just with different looking designs and knobs. Here's a link I found in trying to find photo corrections with GIMP. https://graphicdesignresource.com/mastering-gimps-color-tools-for-photo-color-correction/