1982 World's Fair

The 1982 World's Fair was held in Knoxville, Tennessee, in the United States. The theme of the exposition was "Energy Turns the World."

It opened on May 1, 1982, and closed on October 31, 1982 after receiving over 11 million visitors. Participating nations included Australia, Belgium, Canada, China, Denmark, Egypt, France, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Korea, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Panama, Peru, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, United Kingdom, United States, and West Germany. Panama never occupied its pavilion space, which was eventually occupied by a group of Caribbean Island nations.

A TV station was built just for the fair, KM2XKA on Channel 7 with World's Fair info for Knoxville viewers. Today it belongs to DTV-only WMAK, an independent station.

The fair was constructed on a 70 acre site between downtown Knoxville and the University of Tennessee. The Sunsphere, a convert|266|ft|m|sing=on steel tower topped with a five-story gold globe, was built for the 1982 World's Fair. It still stands and remains a symbol for the city of Knoxville.

In 2007, the East Tennessee Historical Society opened an exhibit commemorating the 25th anniversary of the World's Fair.

Genesis of the World's Fair

The idea for a World's Fair in Knoxville came from a visit to Spokane, Washington, in 1974 that touted the benefits of the Expo for the city. Stewart Evans, president of the Downtown Knoxville association came up with the idea. He brought it to the city and the mayor.

Knoxville Mayor Kyle Testerman appointed banker Jake Butcher to lead an exploratory committee on the fair, and Butcher served as the driving force behind the fair. Many Knoxvillians called it "Jake's Fair." Many Knoxvillians supported the world's fair after an article in the New York Times called Knoxville "a scruffy little city" and stated that it could never support or host the world's fair appropriately. [ [http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=K026 TN Encyclopedia: KNOXVILLE WORLD'S FAIR OF 1982 ] ]

This was the second World's Fair to be held in Tennessee, the first being the Tennessee Centennial Exposition of 1897, held in Nashville.

Opening day

On 1 May 1982, the 1982 World's Fair opened with the Theme "Energy Turns the World". Across the United States, people had been bombarded with commercials: "You've Got To Be There" became the call for people to journey that summer to Tennessee. The opening ceremony was broadcast on local and regional TV, with President Ronald Reagan arriving to open the fair. TV personality Dinah Shore was the mistress of ceremonies, and artists such as Porter Waggoner and Ricky Scaggs performed as the gates were opened on Knoxville's Fair. A six month pass to the fair sold for $100.00.

The fair

The fair drew over 11 million visitors, making it one of the most popular world's fairs in U.S. history, and even turned a small profit ($57), but short of the projected $5 million surplus. [Associated Press, [http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=PI&s_site=philly&p_multi=PI&p_theme=realcities&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0EB298EEC7336255&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM 1982 WORLD'S FAIR SHOWS $57 PROFIT] , February 3, 1985, Page F11, Philadelphia Inquirer]

The most popular exhibits at the fair were those by China, Peru and Egypt. The Peruvian exhibit featured a mummy which was unwrapped and studied at the fair. The Egyptian exhibit featured ancient artifacts valued at over thirty million dollars. [ [http://web.archive.org/web/20070509002102/http://users.vnet.net/schulman/1982/fair.html 1982 World's Fair Research Site] , by Bruce Schulman] Hungary, the home country of the Rubik's Cube, sent a large, automated Rubik's Cube with rotating squares for the entrance to their pavilion. The cube is still present in downtown Knoxville. Every night of the fair, at 10pm, a 10 minute fireworks display was presented that could be seen over much of Knoxville.

Difficulties with the fair

The biggest problem associated with the fair was that local hotels and other accommodations were not allowed to take reservations directly for rooms during the fair. Room reservations for everything from hotels to houseboats sold in a package with fair admission tickets through the first 11 days of the fair were handled by a central bureau, Knoxvisit, but financial and administrative troubles pushed reservations to be taken over by PLM [UPI, [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?sec=travel&res=9B0DE2DD1F39F931A25751C1A964948260 Tennessee Sues World's Fair For 3,500 Tourists' Refunds] , The New York Times, December 12, 1982] , which itself filed for bankruptcy [ [http://nl.newsbank.com/nl-search/we/Archives?p_product=AT&p_theme=at&p_action=search&p_maxdocs=200&p_topdoc=1&p_text_direct-0=0EB7D0F62B6DDE83&p_field_direct-0=document_id&p_perpage=10&p_sort=YMD_date:D&s_trackval=GooglePM OLYMPIC-SIZE TASK: Committee faces challenge in managing hotel bookings] , The Atlanta Journal and The Atlanta Constitution, October 15, 1991, page C1] and was mired in its own difficulties. [ [http://www.newspaperarchive.com/LandingItems/GLP/LP9.aspx?search=knoxville%20international%20energy%20exposition&
] ] It is theorized that Jake Butcher's United American Bank failed in part to his financing of the World's Fair.Fact|date=July 2008 This occurred on February 14, 1983, when FDIC took over the bank due to irregularities in financial records.

After the fair

In 1991, the city of Knoxville demolished the U.S. Pavilion in a controlled blast. This was due to structural failure that could not be safely resolved. The cleared site became a parking lot along Cumberland Avenue. The former site of the Korean and Saudi Arabian pavilions and the Tennessee Gas Industries exhibit became host to a regular concert series for eight years.

In 2000, the park was closed for two years while a convention center was added in the space formerly occupied by Rich's/Millers Garage, the KUB Substation and the former site of America's Electric Energy Exhibit.

In 2002, the World's Fair Park was reopened to general events and concerts, such as Earth Fest and Greek Fest. A July 4th celebration is held there every year with the Knoxville Symphony playing a free concert with a massive fireworks display.

The Sunsphere's observation deck reopened to the public in 2007.

The fair in popular culture

The fair was mentioned twice in "The Simpsons". In the 1993 episode "Cape Feare," Homer smokes a Knoxville World's Fair cigar in the movie theatre. On the Season 5 audio commentary for this episode, showrunner Al Jean comments that 1982 was a terrible world's fair. In the episode entitled "Bart on the Road," Bart, Milhouse, Nelson and Martin take a trip to Knoxville under the belief that the World's Fair is still in progress, on the advice of a 1982 AAA guidebook, choosing Knoxville over Disney World. They arrive to find the Sunsphere now being used as storage for a wig store. Subsequently, Nelson knocks it over when he throws a rock at it.

Seven arcade tokens were minted for the 1982 World's Fair, each depicting a different arcade game. These tokens were given out at the arcade at the World's Fair itself. The seven games on each of the tokens are "Pac-Man", "Ms. Pac-Man", "Space Invaders", "Qix", "Gorf", "Scramble", and "Donkey Kong". Each of these games was very popular at the time. A special Coke pin given to 500 dignitaries on opening day is the most prized pin from the fair.

New inventions

The Knoxville World's Fair debuted several new inventions, including touch screen display screens, boxed milk, and the Cherry Coke flavor by Coca-Cola. Petro's also debuted at the 1982 World's Fair. [http://www.petros.com/1.22/html/h_history.htm]

See also

* World's Fair
* Sunsphere
* East Tennessee Historical Society
* National Conservation Exposition

References

External links

* [http://web.archive.org/web/20070509002102/http://users.vnet.net/schulman/1982/fair.html 1982 World's Fair Research Site] , by Bruce Schulman
* [http://web.knoxnews.com/web/worldsfair/ World's Fair 20th anniversary retrospective] , "Knoxville News Sentinel", 2002
* [http://www.worldsfairphotos.com/knoxville82/ The 1982 World's Fair in photos - www.worldsfairphotos.com]
* [http://www.1982worldsfair.com/ 1982 World's Fair 25th Anniversary site]
* [http://tennesseeencyclopedia.net/imagegallery.php?EntryID=K026 Tennessee Encyclopedia article]
* [http://www.expomuseum.com/1982/ ExpoMuseum's 1982 World's Fair Section]