In celebration of Women’s History Month, Cooper Hewitt is dedicating select Object of the Day entries to the work of women designers in our collection. Nudged in a single exuberant moment between a decade of the Great Depression and the looming threat of World War II, the 1939 World’s Fair is popularly thought to have...

Little is known about American architect Christian Francis Rosborg other than a few projects and drawings attributed to his name that rest in Cooper Hewitt’s collection. Trained early on under the mentorship of New York-based architects Ernest Flagg and Haydel & Shepard, the obscure figure was part of the early twentieth-century stylistic transition from French-influenced...

Prolific cartoonist Peter Arno composed this cover for The New Yorker to celebrate the reopening of the 1939 New York World’s Fair in 1940.[1] The drawing depicts attendants, hosts, and representatives looking towards the fairground’s entrance in anticipation of large crowds. With the looming threat of World War II, the 1940 season of the 1939 New...

“Located on a larger tract of land in the transportation area, the aviation exhibit gives the visitor a realistic picture of a busy metropolitan airport. The dome-like rear portion holds  an invisibly suspended transport plane in full flight against a projected night sky.”[1] Published in the 1939 New York World’s Fair brochure, this description and...

In 1939, the pioneering industrial designer Donald Deskey, was asked to participate in the Contemporary Industrial Arts Exhibition to be held at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in early 1940.  For his project, he designed a prefabricated weekend cabin, called “Sportshack,” depicted in this air-brush rendering. The many innovations in the house included a large...