The beautiful Golden Rondelle of Johnson's Wax International at the New York World's Fair is attracting long lines of excited fairgoers to view the extraordinary film "To Be Alive!" This spectacular building has six stem-like columns which are 90 feet high and suspend a massive golden disc which contains a 500-seat air-conditioned theater. The soaring superstructure is topped with arched petals that curve inward to form a partial canopy. The columns encircle a reflecting pool that contains fountains and is rimmed by gardens of Golden Rondelle marigolds. The companion building, a curved double-decked promenade, contains entertaining and educational exhibits.

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ROME WASN'T built in a day and neither are World's Fairs.

Plans for Johnson participation in the New York World's Fair first began to jell on Nov. 7, 1961, when the Public Relations Committee recommended that the company lease and reserve a prime site. A few weeks later the Management Committee approved this recommendation, and since that time it has been planning and re-planning, viewing and reviewing. A special World's Fair Committee was appointed under the direction of R. P. Gardiner, Senior vice President. Several hundred people have been involved, however, ranging from a crew of Mohawk Indians, who erected the 90-foot high, 17-ton petals crowing the Golden Rondelle, to an international award winning film director.

Our company has had somewhat of a tradition about participation in World's Fairs dating back to the Chicago Fair 31 years ago. Many aspects of the recent Seattle Fair were like a small-scale dress rehearsal for this one as far as many of our personnel were concerned. This was particularly true for Peter Crane and Robert Burgess, who worked as a manager-assistant team in Seattle and are now working at the New York Fair in the same capacity.

President Howard M. Packard said the decision to enter the Fair was influenced mainly by a desire to emphasize the international operations of our company, which established its first overseas plant 50 years ago and now has 24 associate companies located around the world.

"The basic theme - Peace Through Understanding - gives us a remarkable opportunity for stimulating goodwill on a person-to-person basis," Mr. Packard said.

He explained that the company considers even the styling of the Golden Rondelle as symbolic of the forward-looking spirit of Johnson because of its advanced architectural design. This is further reflected in the quality of the entertainment and the exhibits.

While anything but "traditional" in the structural sense, the Johnson Fair building follows the same pioneering spirit attributed to the commissioning of our Wright-designed business buildings.

"The Fair will be a world-wide architectural showcase," Mr. Packard said, "and we consider the Golden Rondelle as yet another architectural symbol for a company noted for its integrity and concern for the consumer."

But is it "good business"?

Our experience at the Seattle Fair suggests we can expect 8 to 10 million people to visit the Golden Rondelle in the next two years. The central location of our exhibit is on the mainstream of visitor traffic and Fair officials predict that up to 90% of the Fair's estimated 80 to 90 million visitors will pass by our exhibit. And although the Fair has been open only a matter of days, millions more already have been exposed to the Johnson name through publicity on television and radio and in newspapers and magazines.

It is estimated that 90% of Fair goers will pass our exhibit which is located on two of the main thoroughfares.

Advertising & Merchandising Director D.L. Smith put it this way: "The Fair offers our company a unique opportunity to register a specific sales value on visitors to our exhibit, provides an awareness of the value of our products, as well as establishing a favorable impression about Johnson's corporate nature, portraying the company as a dynamic, progressive organization in the highest American tradition."

The opportunities then are really two-fold - project our company as an international good citizen, and present our products as being worthy of international acceptance. Let's visit the Golden Rondelle and see how these opportunities are being realized.

We must remember first of all a Fair is fun, and despite its architectural beauty the Golden Rondelle has been designed to offer fun and entertainment. Gaily colored mobiles at the entrance invite the Fair visitors to come in and share this fun. Handsome young men and attractive young girls in smartly designed uniforms serve as hosts and hostesses. They have been recruited from a dozen foreign countries as well as many parts of the United States. Many of them speak two or more languages so even our foreign guests can be warmly welcomed in their native tongue.

The building has been functionally designed to provide a natural flow of traffic. It was designed by Lippincott & Marguiles, the internationally renowned design firm. The firm was commissioned more than two years ago because of its unusually close familiarity with our company through the development of our corporate symbol. The firm had six industrial clients considering Fair entries but agreed to counsel only our company to insure the project would receive quality attention from its complete staff.

One of the first exhibits to be seen in our pavilion resembles a giant jewel case and features beautiful flooring from around the world and the various Johnson products used to care for them. Another displays the various Service Products and Chemical Division products all carefully arranged so the visitor does not have the impression that he is going through a container museum.

This attractive display features various types of floors from countries all over the world.

This leads him to the "warm-up" area, adjacent to the theater. Here one of the hostesses introduces herself and gives a short presentation. She tells the visitor about the move he is about to see and explains its unique three-screen operation. There are several little stages or platforms about the area and as she moves form one to another she tells more about our company- how the business started with S.C. Johnson first selling parquet flooring and then the wax to care for it. She tells how the company expanded internationally, how it is diversifying into new fields. She describes the complexities of the research and development that is continually carried on. There are pictures of the Tower, the Administration Building, Wingspread and other Johnson buildings around the world. She tells about the ART:USA collection and its world tour.

Crowds in the "warm-up" area learn how our company started with the parquet flooring business. In the background are photos of some of our TV stars, past and present.

And then she invites them into the movie.

When you get 300 hard-boiled New York area newspaper reporters and magazine writers to interrupt an 18-minute movie four times with applause and then have them give a two-minute standing ovation at the end - brother, you've got something. This is actually what happened at a press preview of the movie, "To Be Alive," in the Golden Rondelle theater. And when these critics returned to their typewriters they pounded out words of praise in glowing terms that our own publicity writers would have hesitated to use.

The film is the creation of Francis Thompson and Alexander Hammid, veteran documentary producers. They were commissioned to produce the film by H. F. Johnson, Chairman, two years ago with instruction only to "make a film that will adhere to the World's Fair theme of 'Peace Through Understanding.'"

Thompson and Hammid shot the film over the last 18 months in Europe, Africa and the United States with a rig of three cameras bolted together and then edited the results - some two hours of film - into 18 minutes for simultaneous projection on three 18-foot-wide screens. When Hammid started out on the assignment he was so exited that he forgot his tickets. That excitement is still in the film.

Mr. Hammid (left) and Peter Powell, an assistant, found the Nigerians respectful but curious about their custom-built equipment. Above are the three 35mm Arriflex cameras used to make the motion picture which had to be set and focused independently though they operated in sychronization. At right is a scene from the movie shot in the Galleria in Naples.

Although frankly designed to move viewers with the richness of its scenes and sounds, the movie also contains a message: There is an abundance of happiness in the world for those who will look for it.

"Life is too much of a 'rat race' to millions of people in the complicated society in which we live today," says Mr. Thompson, "se we have tried to show that joy has survived in the world for those who aren't too preoccupied."

Much of the impact of the film is the result of artful editing and the choice of sequences of related and contrasting pictures on the three screens. At some times the scene is a single, panoramic image and at others a rapidly changing series of multiple impressions.

The musical score is an original composition by Gene Forell, who is widely known for his film sound tracks, ballet and opera and as a musical director for television and radio.

Alexander Hammid and Francis Thompson, producers of the show, "To Be Alive," found that the Golden Rondelle Theater was nearly acoustically perfect. Size of the three screens is indicated by the three hostesses standing in front of them.

The motion picture is completely free of commercialism of any kind and it is projected without even the customary titles and credits. Every second of the 18 minutes' showing time is devoted to the action of the film itself. There is, of course, no admission charge to the theater. Reeves sound Studios, Inc., of New York provided the unusual projection equipment and supervised the engineering of the theater for projectors, screens, sound and other equipment.

A one-time painter, Francis Thompson holds a long list of film awards including a 1958 Cannes Film Festival blue ribbon for his documentary, "N.Y., N.Y." in which he created an abstract image of Manhattan composed of floating skyscrapers and whirling streets.

Hammid also is widely recognized in the film world as director of "Hymn of The Nations" with Arturo Toscanini, an amusing "Private Life of a Cat," and a television series on Pablo Casals and Jascha Heifetz.

While the movie is devoid of commercialism, the Golden Rondelle, as mentioned before, is not a completely altruistic venture.

After the visitor leaves the theater, a gently sloping ramp leads him to an area where a bank of automatic shoe shine machines beckons him to a free shine. These machines were tested at the Wisconsin State Fair and the Seattle Fair, and in both instances proved to be outstanding attractions. Other Fair exhibitors are openly envious of this part of our exhibit. Here we have an opportunity to personally demonstrate the merits of one of our line of products in such a way that the customer cannot help but feel appreciative. A free two-bit shoe shine in New York - and particularly at a Fair - is not an everyday occurrence. We have enough machines to do 300 shoe shines an hour for the duration of the two-year Fair.

This battery of machines provide 300 shoe shines per hour.             Housewives find they can get instantaneous answers electronically to almost any home care problem.
	A youngster amuses himself before the magic mirrors of the Fun Machine.
	Two young ladies find themselves in a jungle of plastic reeds which has them trapped momentarily in the Fun Machine which is designed for - and available only to - the young folks.

Dad will probably be the best customer at the shoe shine center, but Mom isn't forgotten either. Instant information on virtually any home care problem is available at her fingertips provided by eight computer-operated tele-type machines. all she has to do is select her question form a list of those we have found to be the most perplexing, press the appropriate button and the answer is typed out for her on a souvenir card with lightening speed. The tele-types are hooked up to computers in the National Cash Register pavilion where the answers have been programmed. If the question is unique, cards are available at the information desk and the questions are then sent to our Consumer Education director Lucile Bush for a personal answer.

Fun for all the family has been our goal and this, of course, includes the youngsters. While Mom and Dad are busy, the youngsters can let loose in the fun machine, a maze of old-fashioned funhouse mirrors and modern science-fiction robots, tunnels and noisemakers.

The Golden Rondelle is as dramatically exciting at night as in the daytime.

This, then, is the Johnson exhibit at the World's Fair. The objective has been to present our company to the millions of Fair visitors as we who work for it know it to be - a dynamic international company, but friendly and helpful. There's no "hard sell" here; rather a subtle blend of beauty, happiness and excellence that will reflect favorably on our company and its products for years to come.

Source: Johnson Magazine, Spring 1964, Volume 36, No. 2