The Glorious Mid-Century
If you spend any time watching House Hunter shows on HGTV or DIY Network (aka Magnolia Network), you have watched people rave about mid-century this or mid-century that. It is not atypical that we look back at the past with rose-colored glasses. Every generation does it to some degree. The past always looks rosier, probably because we remember the good and forget the bad. There is also the reality that looking back to our youth nostalgically as a wonderful time is likely a function of remembering times when we were in our prime and able to do more and enjoy more before the rigors of adulthood and the aches and pains of aging set in, as they most often do. Mid-century is exactly that time for most of us Baby Boomers. Generally speaking, it means the 1950’s and 1960’s, the so-called Wonder Years. Did you ever wonder why they are called the Wonder Years? I think we can take our cue from the TV show by that very name. The transitional years of coming-of-age are the bittersweet times of confusion and wonder that we all share in one form or another. Those are the years of hormonal surges and a combination of the carefree times of youth combined with the eye-opening realization that anything is possible. Those idyllic times are universally revered as good times for completely understandable reasons.
Now let’s get real. This morning I am sitting in the food court of the historic (1962) TWA Flight Wing One Terminal at JFK Airport. That is the terminal that Eero Saarinen, the Finnish-American architect designed right before he designed the 630-foot Gateway Arch that graces the Mississippi River at St. Louis. This place is the quintessential symbol of Mid-Century chic. It harkens back to a time when John F. Kennedy was holding court in Camelot. It was a time when JFK was fighting for liberty against Russia in Cuba and Berlin much like Volodymyr Zelenskyy is taking center stage today as Russia once again tries to flex its muscles of autocracy, this time in Ukraine. Zellenskyy is forty-four years old right now, just like John F. Kennedy was in 1962. People often say that JFK enjoys inordinate fame and glory for what many consider objectively as a short and flawed tenure as the United States president. But martyrs are not born out of tenure or perfection, they are born out of passion and the confluence of events of the moment. They take stands when the world needs someone at center stage. One cannot look at a picture of JFK without wondering how a man with such young children could have had so much responsibility thrust upon his otherwise not-so-strong back. Today, when Zellenskyy comes on TV, as he does several times each day, we all have similar thoughts about this green camo-clad hero. Kennedy was a hero for democracy and all the people of the world. Zellenskyy, in a mere three weeks, has attained the same status. Some day my children will likely be sitting in an airport terminal named after him.
It’s funny how writing ones thought of the moment can connect dots that otherwise would pass with a vague sense of deja vu. I am reminded that past the rose-colored glass of Mid-Century, there lies a harsh reality that the arch-nemesis of all of our lives was and is the Empire of Russia. Russia is a country that has the largest landmass of any country at 11% of the current landmass of the world. Russia has 1.81% of the world’s population. It has 1.75% of the world’s GDP. Compare that to the statistics of the United States. We have 6.1% of the world’s landmass, very much in line with China (6.3%), Canada (6.1%), Brazil (5.6%) and Australia (5.2%). We have 329 million people, more than twice Russia and we have 4.16% of world population, well less than China (18.2%) and India (17.7%). As for GDP, we really show our strength with 24.7%. To be crystal clear, our GDP is equal to the next three biggest GDP generators (China, Japan and Germany) combined. We are far and away #1 in GDP where Russia sits at a lowly #11 behind even Italy, and only a smidge more than South Korea. And of course, all of these statistics were BEFORE the recent round of sanctions were put into place, which will decidedly move Russia down dramatically in the economic ranks. Look at the impact on North Korea, whose GDP is estimated at less than $25 billion or at approximately rank #100 versus its southern brother at at #12 at $1.5 trillion. And yet, despite all of these statistics, Russia punch’s way above their weight class thanks to the post-WWII outcome of them becoming a nuclear power. Crazy.
This is where I am supposed to tie this all back into a discussion of what the Mid-Century (that would be Mid-Twentieth-Century) environment did for the world. On the geopolitical front it is clear that it laid the foundation for the last seventy-five years of astounding prosperity and human advancement, but then again, by avoiding the stinker in the room, the Baby Ruth in the punch bowl, the Russian in the woodshed, it has kicked the can to world peace down the road to the reckoning we seem to be living today. I’m not sure I want to suggest that we should have annihilated Russia back in 1948 when we had the chance, but somehow seeing how in-line and copasetic we have become with Japan, Germany and Italy, the Axis powers of WWII, and how they have prospered for it, one does wonder if we could have done something that was both better for sustained world peace and better for the Russian people than we did by letting them stomp around the world the way they have. That is certainly an ethnocentric view of the world, so I will refrain from such conjecture, but it sure is tempting.
But now let’s see what we can say about all that Mid-Century nostalgia. I’m going to use the TWA Hotel at JFK as my example because it is clearly in my mind at the moment. To begin with, it is very convenient as the only hotel within the confines of the airport grounds. It was literally grandfathered into that position, but it is a nice casual walk from the Jet Blue Terminal 5, which is our arrival point of choice these days. That’s a nice thing for weary travelers. Then there are those Eero Saarinen arched walkways. They look nice, but travel less nicely with red carpeting (not a good sustainable airport surface) and dragging bags across them is a bit of a chore. Then there is the zoomy interior design. Beautiful, but far less functional for today’s traveler. We literally had to find the back-alley ramps to walk down and around to get to the front desk or up to the room elevator lobbies. The dining room is on a very Mid-Century elegant and delicately designed mezzanine, but the stairs, as pretty as they are, are sort of half-height and simply don’t climb right. You feel like a kid that wants to step up same-footed as you go up to the landing. All the tables are that tulip round with the thin stems. Pretty, but less than stable and user-friendly. The acoustics are also far less than optimal with the barn-like open space of the lobby and dining all rolled into one. As for the rooms, well, they are small and efficient and built for one. Problem is, we, like most people, travel as two. The double plugs won’t accommodate two Apple plugs at once. The wireless recharger didn’t work. And there was no room for closets so you get summer camp wall pegs for your clothes. The good news was that it did have a big flat screen TV, which Kim only bumped her head on several times getting in and out of bed.
The bottom line on the Glorious Mid-Century to me is now that I would prefer to leave it in the seventy-five year rear-view mirror. I can do that with the Saarinen TWA Hotel, and only wish I could with Stalinist Rule-the-World Russia.