This World U.F.O. Day marks the 72nd anniversary of the 1947 Roswell U.F.O. Incident. The Hagley Library is marking the occasion with this aspirational intergalactic traveler, who was photographed perusing his options for traveling the space ways at the National Association of Manufacturers’ Americade exposition (ca. 1955-1956), a massive traveling exhibit that encouraged American visitors to imagine new possibilities in the bold new future of the year 1975.
The exposition was divided into two interrelated sections. The first section dramatized attainable improvements in human and scientific progress. The second presented an argument for free competitive enterprise as an essential component needed for full realization of the nation’s vast potential, which included solar energy powered homes and everyday citizens traveling the solar system on rocketships.
Photographs and documentation related to the Americade exhibit are part of the Hagley Library’s National Association of Manufacturers photographs and audiovisual materials collection (Accession 1973.418). To visit this collection’s page in our Digital Archive, click here.











