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Contributing Stone. Expo's skyline offers a miragelike assortment of architectural marvels, ranging from West Germany's gigantic undulating steel-rod-reinforced tent to Russia's glass-encased structure to Britain's blunted, flag-blazoned spire to the U.S.'s 20-story-high geodesic sphere to the pioneering functionalism of Habitat 67 (where Pearson has an apartment) and Canada's own inverted pyramid Katimavik (Eskimo for gathering place). The unifying theme of the exposition, "Man and His World," is taken from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's Terre des Homines and his ringing affirmation: "To be a man is to feel that by carrying one stone you can contribute to the building of the world." Fittingly enough, there have never before been so many government sponsored exhibitions (Expo's 62 countries easily top the 42 at Brussels, 25 in Seattle, 13 at New York's fair). Expo also has the most distinguished advance booking in history: over 50 of the world's kings, princes and presidents have announced plans to pass through the welcoming gates at Place d'Accueil before they close Oct. 27.
Some time late in July, Charles de Gaulle will sail into Montreal harbor aboard a French warship. Castro and Tito are expected, as are Lyndon Johnson, Harold Wilson, Emperor Haile Selassie, Queen Elizabeth of Britain, Princess Christina of Sweden, Belgium's Prince Albert and The Netherlands' Queen Juliana. A complex computer-linked operations board will be used to plot each minute of every state visit to be sure that entourages never encounter one another.
Ice Control & Computers. Such unblinking vigilance over the slightest details of their vast operation is typical of Canada's Expo initiators. From the moment in 1962 when International Exhibitions picked Montreal as the site for '67 (over Moscow, which showed early enthusiasm for an exhibition, then faded from contention), the Canadians began trying to achieve perfection. Principal spark plug was Montreal's dynamic mayor, Jean Drapeau, who buoyantly declared as the first-stage preparations began: "Montreal will not be plagued by lack of imagination!"
True enough. To transport armies of Expo goers from Montreal's downtown, a new, $213 million, 16.1-mile subway was tunneled under the city. Trucks roared along the city streets 24 hours a day, dumped thousands of tons of fill from the subway excavation into the river, extended the mud flat that was the He Sainte-Hélène and created the He Notre Dame, which became Expo's major sites. New bridges, a spaghetti pattern of elevated highways, and a theater complex, Place des Arts, were constructed. To provide an upstream system of ice control, Expo masterminds even built a 6,693-ft. ice boom to keep thundering tons of springtime floes from smashing into the new islands.