Expo 67 in Montreal - Mission Impossible

Expo 67. These 2 words bring up intense emotions in Montreal. When I moved to Canada 17 years ago, I quickly understood the 1967 World’s Fair in Montreal must have been quite a special event to hold such a place in the collective psyche. This weekend I watched the documentary “Expo 67 Mission Impossible” and I was amazed and proud to hear the full story and somewhat regretful not to have seen Expo 67 in person. Wherever you live, I encourage you to watch this 68-minute documentary and learn more about this impossible achievement. Thank you Sébastien Hylands for encouraging me to discover this documentary!

The 1967 World Fair was supposed to take place in Moscow but the Soviet Union cancelled it and Montreal was awarded it in late 1962. Montreal decided to present the exposition under the theme “Terre des hommes” (Man and his World) inspired by Saint-Exupéry’s eponymous memoir.

Instead of expropriating neighbourhoods, Montreal team made the bold decision to create a new island (Notre Dame Island, which now hosts Montreal Formula 1 Grand Prix, amongst other things), expand the existing Ste-Hélène Island and dig a tunnel under the St-Lawrence River to connect the islands to the city subway system. This crazy project required to dig up 7 million tons of soil from the bottom of the St-Lawrence River; transport 15 million tons of soil and rocks by trucks; erect 847 buildings, 27 bridges, 82 km of roads, 37 km of sewers, 160 km of water, gas and electricity pipes and connections, etc.

Montreal only had 4 years and-a-half to complete a project that other cities had required more than 10 years to deliver. Computer simulations at the time predicted that Expo 67 would be ready in … October 1969! Aside from the obvious technical and financial difficulties, Expo 67 faced multiple challenges to gain public and political approval for the project, including its name (created by Yves Jasmin) as well as its logo designed by Montreal artist Julien Hébert.

Expo 67 was led by Canadian diplomat Pierre Dupuy and his management team (nicknamed “Les Durs”, meaning “the tough guys”) was formed of Robert Fletcher Shaw, Andrew Kniewasser, Colonel Edward Churchill (who used the “critical path schedule” method developed during WWII to build the atomic bomb), Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien, Pierre de Bellefeuille, Yves Jasmin, édouard Fiset, Jean-Claude Delorme and Dale Rediker.

In the CBC French podcast listed below as well as "Tout le monde en parle" interview with Yves Jasmin in 2017, Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien explained his fight to convince the Executive Committee of the City of Montreal not to cancel La Ronde, the famous amusemenet park which remains a Montreal landmark to this day. Thanks to his wife's childhood contacts, Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien met Walt Disney himself and received the help of two employees of Walt Disney for 6 months in order to develop the concept of La Ronde. Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien had the genious idea of the Expo 67 Passport in order to incentivize visitors to discover smaller pavilions and therefore to better spread the crowd throughout Expo 67.

Moreover, Yves Jasmin ran a very succesful marketing campaign, including its infamous advertisement in U.S. media about the Soviet pavilioné You can see the picture of this advertisement in the comments of my post at: https://www.dhirubhai.net/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6592017194178142209.

In spite of all the catastrophic forecasts, Expo 67 opened on April 28,1967 as promised and visitors were able to admire 90 pavilions from 60 foreign countries and various states, provinces and cities. The 6-month fair attracted a record number of 54,991,806 visitors (compared to an initial target of 35 million visitors), including the single-day attendance record for a World’s Fair with 569,500 visitors on its 3rd day. Renowned Visitors included Queen Elizabeth II, French President Charles de Gaulle, Greece King Constantin II, U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson, Princess of Monaco Grace Kelly, Jackie Kennedy, Robert Kennedy and Marlene Dietrich.

The total cost of Expo 67 ended up being 10 times the initial estimates of Cdn$40 million: the final costs of Cdn$400 million represents approximately Cdn $3 billion in current dollars. The investment paid off however! Expo 67 was such a success that all subsequent World’s Fairs have been called “Expo”. Expo 67 is widely considered to be the most successful World’s Fairs of the 20th century, if not ever. As Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien has said, “we did something extraordinary with very ordinary people” (”on a fait quelque chose d’extraordinaire avec des gens bien ordinaires”).

Many installations were closed down or removed over the years, including for the Montreal 1976 Summer Olympics, but a few landmark structures remain, such as :

- Habitat 67 housing complex, designed by now world-acclaimed Israeli-Canadian architect Moshe Safdie. Habit 67 was designed as his master's thesis in architecture at McGill University in Montreal from which he graduated in 1961, then built for Expo 67

- La Ronde amusement park and entertainment complex, which contains the last portion of the famous Minirail monorail transportation system

- the magnificent Biosphere geodesic dome designed by renowned U.S. architect Buckminster Fuller as U.S. pavilion – pictures of the Minirail running through the pavilion are stunning (see my LinkedIn post mentioned below)

- the Montreal Casino, which includes the former French and Québec pavilions

-Jean Drapeau Park (named after visionary Montreal Mayor Jean Drapeau, who was intrumental to inspire Montreal to host the Expo 67 and 1976 Summer Olympics) - the park comprises Ste-Hélène Island and Notre Dame Island and is a very popular park amongst Montrealers. Notre Dame Island hosts Formula 1 races in Montreal

I recall assisting to a real estate networking event a few years ago in the Jamaican Pavilion. It was quite special to think about the history of the site!

As an update: Architectural Digest published an article a few days ago after I initially published this article, with beautiful pictures of the newly renovated Expo 67 site by Lemay architectural firm. See the pictures at https://www.architecturaldigest.com/story/montreals-iconic-expo-67-completed-major-renovation.

Please see pictures and comments on my Linkedin post at https://www.dhirubhai.net/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6592017194178142209. You can also find riveting pictures and info at the following websites:

- https://expo-67.ca/en/the-film (Documentary website)

- https://expo67.ncf.ca (Amazing bank of hundreds of pictures)

- https://blogue.onf.ca/blogue/2017/09/29/photos-pavillons-expo-67 (Pictures of many pavilions)

- https://ici.radio-canada.ca/premiere/emissions/aujourd-hui-l-histoire/segments/entrevue/23910/histoire-expo67-montreal-philippe-gaspe-beaubien (CBC podcast in French with Philippe de Gaspé Beaubien)

- https://www.journaldemontreal.com/2017/04/22/le-cinquantenaire-expo-67-album-photos-dun-ete-memorable (Journal de Montreal article and photo album in French)

You will also notice from the picture above that downtown Montreal has changed quite a lot since 1967! If you want to see a comparison with current downtown Montreal, please see my photos at https://www.dhirubhai.net/posts/arquinanthony_realestate-history-architecture-activity-6560168236187475968-53aE .

A quote from the Expo 67 team struck me while watching Expo 67 documentary: “This might be a dream but I think it’s time we start dreaming in our world of realities”. 52 years later, this dream continues to inspire generations of Quebeckers.