Historian Robert Rydell describes how world’s fairs inspired and promoted innovations in architecture, the arts, music, science, and technology, not to mention consumer culture and mass entertainment. His presentation complements the exhibit Inventing the Modern World: Decorative Arts at the World’s Fairs, 1851-1939 currently on display at the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art.

A professor of history at Montana State University, Rydell is author of All the World’s a Fair: Visions of Empire at American International Expositions, 1876-1916; Fair America: World’s Fairs in the United States; and World of Fairs: The Century-of-Progress Expositions.

Watch at c-span.org