A Taste of the Fair... Literally!

Last week, we headed to the New York State Fair. No, it wasn't for the Justin Bieber concert, and no it wasn't for the dollar baked potatoes either (although they were good)! No we were there to sample Belgian waffles at Maurice's: a fair stand claiming to serve the original 1964 world's fair "Bel-Gem" waffle recipe. The waffle was tasty, although I think Maurice's might offer just a few more options than were available at the original fair. Here's a look at Maurice's. For those who were at the 1964-65 fair, you be the judge: Is this what you remember?

An Excerpt from the Railroad Museum of Long Island

As promised, below is a brief excerpt from our chat with Don Fisher at the Railroad Museum of Long Island. You'll also see some brief vintage clips, shot by Gustave Martens at the fair. Robert Martens, Gustave's grandson has been kind enough to allow us to use his footage in the film.

Avis Amusement Car is Still Ticking

While almost every company with a pavilion at the World's Fair, went with some sort of futuristic theme, or at least a modern theme, Avis decided to go the other route. One of the big draws at their pavilion was the antique car ride. You have probably seen similar cars at various amusement parks around the country.

The Avis cars were crafted by Arrow Development, the same company that created the first tubular steel coaster (Disneyland's Matterhorn) as well as many of the steel coasters in the U.S. during the coaster boom of the 70's and 80's.

As luck would have it, Avis retained one of the cars from the fair, and after a long life appearing at various promotional events, today the car is located in the lobby of the Avis world headquarters.

I want to especially thank Alice Pereria from Avis for making the car available for filming.

Behind the Scenes: The Map

Sure we're using some fun technology to put the movie together, and of course YouTube and Facebook, etc are key to letting people know about the project. But the one item that's probably more important to this project than any other is... the map.

At the end of the day, it's this 4x5 map that chronicles where different objects from the fair can be found today, where they were previously, and how to get to them today. It's no easy task: we don't have a limitless travel budget, so it is key to try to pack as many things into single trips as we can. However the far-flung locations of many items make it difficult to plan for just a few trips to get to everything.

So if you've ever wondered what we're looking at when we're not posting the site, it's this map: adding locations, marking the ones we've already visited, etc. Sure there are tons of digital mapping solutions, but this is the quickest, easiest way to see at a glance where we've been, and where we're headed.

A Ride on a World's Fair Original

This past weekend, we headed to the Railroad Museum of Long Island. The museum, houses the original (and restored) G-16, or 16" gauge amusement train. The train made its debut as part of the Long Island Railroad pavilion at the fair. Don Fisher, the president of the museum explained the train ended up in a private park for Grumman, before making its way to the museum, where it was restored to its original livery in 2001.

Taking a ride in the train is truly taking a trip through history, and into one of the most authentic World's Fair experiences remaining. And if you're a train buff, I'd suggest a trip to the museum, preferably after the relocated Lionel visitor's center layout debuts at the museum in April of 2011.

We'll have a clip or two from our visit up in a bit.