Twilight at the World of Tomorrow

by James Mauro

  Published in 1939, John Steinbeck’s blockbuster novel The Grapes of Wrath featured its Everyman hero, Tom Joad, waxing philosophically, “Wherever they’s a cop beatin’ up a guy, I’ll be there”—effectively lumping all men in uniform as an enemy of the people. “The policeman is,24 and long has been, in very low repute with many Americans,” Scientific Monthly reported in May. “That policemen are neither very intelligent nor well educated is painfully apparent.”

  That unfair assessment galled brave and dedicated men like detectives Lynch and Socha, who could hardly believe their eyes in the face of such biased reporting. Valentine, in response to all the criticism, nevertheless did little to quell the renewed resentment against his men. “I think the results25 speak for themselves,” was his only statement. “No comment is necessary.”

  * Morris, who ran unsuccessfully for mayor twice in the two terms after La Guardia, would eventually gain recognition as the man to succeed Robert Moses as city parks commissioner in 1960.

  An uncomfortable King George, along with Queen Elizabeth, signs the official guest book for a perplexed Grover Whalen. (Courtesy of the New York Public Library)

  18

  ROYAL FLUSH

  Joe Lynch and Freddy Socha were called again to Flushing Meadows in June when King George and Queen Elizabeth came to visit the World’s Fair. An enormous parade had been scheduled to welcome them, the size and pomp of which Whalen had become famous for. If the weather held out, the city was expecting a crowd even bigger than that which had come out to cheer for Lindbergh. More than a million schoolchildren were to be dismissed from class early so that they could view the procession as the royal couple drove past in an open car.

  But, as usual, there was also trouble. Another in a seemingly endless series of anonymous letters had come across Lieutenant Pyke’s desk, threatening yet another bomb attack. This one was a bit more complicated, Pyke explained to his men. It had been written in pencil on the back of an application form for the Irish Republican Army, for one thing, instead of the more common practice of being crudely typed on an unidentifiable and ordinary piece of stationery. That meant a statement was being made. What kind of statement exactly was left up to the Bomb and Forgery Squad to decipher.

  The bomb threat had taken a long and circuitous route to reach the desks of Lynch, Socha, and the other detectives on Pyke’s team. Together, they stared at copies of it as Pyke explained that the letter had been mailed in Washington, D.C., to the British embassy; from there it had been turned over to the State Department and then finally up to New York, to Pyke’s office for investigation.

  Commissioner Valentine took it seriously enough to arrange a special conference with members of Scotland Yard, the U.S. Secret Service, and the U.S. State Department. Complicating the matter, the letter also listed fifteen individual targets in Manhattan, the Bronx, Brooklyn, and even Newark, New Jersey, where the plot was supposedly being hatched. The Bomb and Forgery Squad would have to check out every location.

  As usual, Lynch and Socha worked as a team, running down addresses in their native Bronx and Brooklyn. When they hit the first address and found it was a saloon, both men took a breath. It was almost a sure bet that every other joint would turn out to be a bar, and as it turned out, they all were. Some idiot’s or anarchist’s idea of a joke.

  Pyke’s men relaxed, thinking they could go back to their normal routine, until new orders came through from Chief Inspector John Ryan, commander of the Detective Division. Practically every detective on the force was given special detail to search all the rooftops and any overhanging buildings along the parade route, from the Battery to Seventy-second Street, through Central Park to the East River Drive, and then over the Triborough Bridge. The extra duty ate up most of their days and kept Pyke’s men from seeing their families except for the eight or nine hours they were allowed to return home and get a decent night’s sleep.

  Additionally, Lynch and Socha were among the one hundred and fifty detectives assigned to mingle with the crowds at the World’s Fair and keep an eye out for suspicious activity while the royals were in attendance.

  At nine-forty on the morning of Saturday, June 10, the royal couple boarded the United States destroyer Warrington for the largely ceremonial sail up the Hudson River, only a short excursion from Fort Hamilton in Brooklyn. Perhaps it was designed to make it look as though the king and queen had just alighted from the long sea voyage out of Dover, or maybe they just wanted to savor the majestic skyline of Manhattan. In either case, they started out the day disappointed; the morning was hot and hazy, and the tops of most of the city’s famous skyscrapers were lost in the mist. Worse, La Guardia later reported that the king was disappointed in the chosen route north along the West Side Highway; he kept asking where Broadway was.

  Grover Whalen got a kick out of that. He, too, was disappointed; he’d wanted to ride in one more spectacular parade, to hear the cheering and drown himself once again in the sea of confetti. But as official World’s Fair host, he stayed put in Flushing Meadows to make sure everything went off perfectly. Then again, he comforted himself, there were no tall office buildings along this alternate parade route out of which workers could rain down the ticker tape, so he wasn’t missing out on much.

  That morning, about three and a half million New Yorkers came out to gawk at the spectacle. Whalen had been expecting the king and queen to come through the gates of the World’s Fair at precisely eleven forty-five; but the enormous crowds slowed the procession to a crawl, and it was almost an hour later when the first car arrived. Whalen was frantic. He knew they were on a tight schedule; the entire visit was supposed to last only about five hours, with the royals leaving at four-thirty to board a train up to Hyde Park for a visit with the Roosevelts. Now it all had to be managed in less than four. The delay, unfortunately, was to have more serious repercussions as far as the king himself was concerned.

  Whalen waited with his wife, Anna, at the entrance to Perylon Hall, nervously checking his watch over and over again. By the time word came that they had finally arrived, at twelve thirty-eight, he was a wreck. The weather was a steam bath. He had planned an official reception to start just after noon and end precisely at twelve-forty, exactly two minutes from now. Whalen had five hundred and sixty distinguished guests upstairs who had already been waiting for hours, and he had gone all out for this one. A million dollars’ worth of tapestries, borrowed from the Metropolitan Museum, lined the walls of the reception area, along with priceless masterpieces of art and Louis XVI furniture. He had even built a special dais upon which the king and queen would receive their minions.

  Now he had two minutes. He didn’t even have that, actually. They were only at the gates, met once again by the oddly formal Haskell Indians and their World of Tomorrow tribal gear. Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the royal party arrived. Whalen bowed, regaining his composure and displaying his impeccable skills at protocol. Without wasting any time, he directed George and Elizabeth into a private elevator with only himself and his wife as passengers. Immediately, Grover sensed something was wrong.

  “When do we eat?”1 the king turned and asked him as soon as the elevator doors were shut.

  Whalen responded that a state luncheon would take place as soon as the ceremony here was finished. The king, he noticed, did not seem pleased. He looked uncomfortable, a little strained, actually, as he took his seat on the dais and the photographers were brought in, along with the World’s Fair guest book. King George signed it quickly, stiffly, as if peeved at all the fuss. In his formal clothes, despite the fact that he was now in air-conditioning, Whalen, decidedly against protocol, began to sweat.

  Fifty young girls from the World’s Fair staff, whom Whalen had chosen personally, ushered in the guests, ten at a time, to bow and curtsy and walk backward for the practiced six paces as they left the royal presence. The girls all wore matching blue dresses adorned with white Trylons and Perispheres, and when they escorted in the first group, Whalen nearly
choked when Vice Admiral Giuseppe Cantu of Italy strode in and immediately stuck out his arm in the Fascist salute of the day.

  “Who was that man?”2 the king demanded. Grover told him, noticing that George now looked even more miserable. And there were still five more groups to go.

  The World’s Fair board of directors came in next, and then the New York City Board of Estimate. Still waiting their turn were the city commissioners, including Robert Moses, and a host of others from all over the country who had traveled to the Fair strictly for an introduction to the king and queen. Whalen gave a slight hand signal to the Fair hostesses to speed things up a bit just as the British ambassador, Sir Ronald Lindsay, came forward and whispered in his ear, “His Majesty is leaving now.”

  “What?” Whalen spun around to face him, apoplectic. “He can’t do that!”

  Then, seeing the king heading for the door, Grover hurried to catch up. La Guardia raced forward and blocked him.

  “What the hell are you doing?”3 he asked. “My commissioners haven’t met the king and queen yet. Why are you ending it now?”

  “Don’t ask me, Fiorello,” Whalen shouted back, running to the exit. “Ask him!”

  They had been in and out of the building in less than fifteen minutes. Whalen knew his guests would be furious, but at least they were making up for lost time. Running out of Perylon Hall ahead of Lindsay and the others, he frantically signaled for the Trytons, the World’s Fair band, to begin playing as the party approached the open cars for the ride up to the Federal Building, where the luncheon was scheduled. It was barely one o’clock, so if everything went smoothly from then on, he could relax again and make the most of what remained of the day.

  But then, of course, it began to rain. Whalen silently cursed his luck. He couldn’t have the royal couple drown on their brief tour of the fairgrounds, so he directed that the canvas tops be put up on the cars as quickly as possible. The king, impatient at yet another delay, stood noticeably fuming.

  At last they all got in. As the car eased its way around the Theme Center, driving slowly so that its passengers could admire the view, the heat inside the closed windows grew insufferable. King George’s face turned crimson; Whalen thought they would all suffocate. It was a rare instance when formalities failed him—opening the windows meant they might all be drenched by the time they reached the Court of Peace; leaving them closed threatened heat prostration.

  Finally, just when the king looked as though he were going to have a stroke, George stopped the car and regally ordered the top down. Whalen closed his eyes and prayed. The weather couldn’t ruin another occasion, not this one. And then, “as if by magic,” he later described it, “the rain stopped at once.”

  The trouble wasn’t over. George jumped out of the car at the edge of the Court of Peace and began hurrying up the south walk of the Hall of Nations. Troops from the U.S. Army, Navy, Marines, and Coast Guard went into a precision drill. Whalen had to race to catch up to the king.

  “Your Majesty, the officer will now ask you to review the troops,” he stated, nearly out of breath.

  “I won’t take the review,” George answered. “When do we eat?”

  Whalen was “shocked speechless.” An aide stepped forward to inform the king that his refusal could be considered an insult to the United States armed forces. Apparently, he didn’t care a whit.

  “Which way is the Federal Building?” he demanded.

  Dumbfounded, Whalen pointed in its direction, and George stormed off at the quickstep. An honor guard was standing at attention at the entrance, led by the U.S. commissioner to the Fair, Edward Flynn, and members of the president’s military staff. Whalen, still flustered, began his formal presentation and then stopped midsentence when the king ignored them all and walked past them into the building by himself.

  “What are you trying to do?” Flynn hissed as they both flew off in pursuit. Finally they got to the root of the problem.

  “Where is it?” the king asked, looking completely desperate.

  Whalen suddenly got it. The sail up from Brooklyn, the ceremony at the dock, and the long delay of the parade had left King George in dire straits intestinally. Grover pointed to a suite of offices on the left. The king, grateful at last, disappeared inside. Whalen took a seat on one of the benches and waited, hoping that at last the storm was over. When he thought about it, the whole thing was almost laughable. Grover had actually held entire meetings—scheduled conferences with the British diplomatic corps—on the subject of “relief” breaks for the king and queen. He had even wanted to set up a personal suite for them in Perylon Hall, where they could be assured the utmost royal privacy.

  “That, Mr. Whalen,” a diplomatic representative had told him stiffly, “will take place on British soil. In the British Pavilion.”

  Protocol, Grover mused, could get you in a lot of trouble sometimes.

  After several long minutes, His Majesty emerged from the bathroom, looking much more relaxed and dignified.

  “The gentleman who occupies this office must be bald,” he said, attempting to gloss over the real reason for his haste. “There’s no comb in there.”

  It’s not my office, Flynn blurted out. Whalen shushed him with an elbow to the ribs.

  The remainder of the day went much more smoothly. Whalen recovered himself and was the consummate host at lunch, though he swore Flynn to secrecy regarding the king’s urgent need for “personal comfort.” He would share the details only with those whose feelings had been hurt and who had been snubbed by the king’s behavior (although later it would become one of his favorite anecdotes about his time at the World’s Fair).

  The royal couple went on to visit several other buildings in the Government Zone, almost all of them connected with the British Empire. And to show that they were good sports after all, they even took a ride on the “trackless train,” the blue-and-orange trams that merrily played “The Sidewalks of New York” while sending pedestrians scurrying out of their way.

  By the time the king and queen departed precisely at four-thirty, as planned, Whalen was drained. He ended the day by starting the music and color exhibition early in the Lagoon of Nations, and despite the fact that it was long before dark, he ordered the fireworks to go off. That afternoon, it included several hundred aerial bombs carrying both the British and American flags.

  Not far away, Lynch and Socha heard the explosions and tensed a moment. Like the other detectives assigned to cover the fairgrounds that day, they had lingered all afternoon in the Court of Peace, pacing again and again from the British Pavilion down Continental Avenue to the League of Nations and back again to Federal Place. When they saw the fireworks go up, the partners eased back, checked their watches, and knew the show was about over. No terrorist bombs anywhere—not in the Bronx or Brooklyn or Newark, and definitely none in Flushing Meadows. For the time being, everyone could relax, though both men knew it was going to be a long summer.

  General Electric’s popular ten-million-volt lightning exhibit dazzled and deafened audiences.

  (© Bettmann/Corbis)

  19

  “I NEVER THOUGHT OF THAT!”

  His previous two excursions to Flushing Meadows having been strictly formal affairs, Albert Einstein decided it would be fun to visit the World’s Fair without having to make a speech. He chose Monday, June 12, an ordinary weekday when he figured there would be fewer people and he could hopefully spend a pleasant afternoon without too much fuss made over him. For company he brought along his sister, Maria, whom he called Maja, and his surviving stepdaughter, Margot. Their host for the day was Judge Irving Lehman, brother of the governor.

  As usual, Einstein dressed casually: gray sweater over an equally plain gray sports shirt. And because he had been warned about the distances to be covered, he chose to forgo his usual sandals and padded around in soft-soled shoes. But no socks; Einstein hated wearing socks.

  The judge had of course notified Grover Whalen of their arrival but repeated the scien
tist’s firm instructions that there were to be no ceremonies involved, especially no Indians of any kind. They were allowed early entrance, and the party spent a pleasant half hour strolling around the grounds, happy to have the place for the most part to themselves. When the exhibits opened and the crowds began strolling in, Einstein directed his group to the Masterpieces of Art building over on the Street of Wheels.

  Just across the bridge from General Motors and the Transportation Zone, the simple, single-story structure was for some reason located in the Communications Zone (probably because they couldn’t figure out anyplace else to put it). There had been quite a controversy1 about the display of art at the Fair; Whalen and his design team had waged a heated war for more than a year over whether or not such an exhibit should even be erected. Manhattan had plenty of art museums if that’s what the customer wanted to see, Whalen had argued; and he doubted anyone would.

  In the end, though, it had become enough of a public embarrassment for him to assign a small plot on the very edge of the Grand Central Parkway, in between Business Systems and the post office. But once it had to be done, Whalen decided to do it right; the three separate pavilions that made up the building contained more than $30 million worth of paintings and sculpture and was considered “one of the most important exhibitions of old masters ever displayed under one roof.” Whalen made sure the guidebook said so.

  It is impossible to know Einstein’s itinerary on this casual visit, but it’s likely he would have been interested in seeing General Electric’s ten-million-volt lightning demonstration in Steinmetz Hall. Architecturally, the GE building itself was unremarkable. One part resembled an enormous Quonset hut, and the other presented a curved entryway fronting the large fountains and pools in the Plaza of Light. The exhibit’s most noticeable, and arresting, feature was a freestanding spire forming the jagged dagger of a lightning bolt—except that this one exploded skyward, up from the earth toward the heavens. Made of stainless steel, the imposing sculpture rose taller than the four sixty-five-foot pylons that represented the four elements at the far end of the Court of Power and was topped by a gyroscope with a star dangling off of one end.