The environmental theme was promoted in several high-profile events, such as a symposium on United Nations World Environment Day (June 5) attended by more than 1,200 people including many international representatives, and ECAFE Day for the United Nations Economic Council for Asia and the Far East (June 14) that discussed regional environment issues.

[7] As Spokane began to grow over its early years, the area would become heavily industrialized with numerous sawmills, flour mills,[8] and hydroelectricity generators.

[12] The presence of railroads within the downtown core was noted by the Olmsted Brothers in 1908 when they began to develop a master plan for parks in the City of Spokane.

The group would hire New York-based Ebasco Services to create an urban renewal plan, which would be released in 1961 and called for the removal of the numerous train tracks and trestles in downtown and reclaiming the attractiveness of the Spokane River[18] in the central business district.

The idea to host caught on—inquiries were made to the Bureau of International Expositions as well as an additional study that was commissioned in the fall of 1970, and results both came back very positive.

[22] The Great Northern depot on Havermale Island and Union Pacific on Spokane Falls Boulevard were both demolished early the following year despite protests from preservationists.

"[25] Uncertainty about the ability of a city the modest size of Spokane to create a successful event caused many nations and corporations to hesitate about making major investments in the fair.

[1] The logo is a stylized Möbius strip, an endless three-dimensional form, which was chosen to symbolize the continuity of life and mankind's relationship with the environment.

[1] The three colors, blue, green, and white, also symbolized the environmental theme of the fair, representing the purity of clean water, the unspoiled natural beauty of growing plants and trees, and the cleanliness of fresh air, respectively.

[26] The opening of Expo '74 occurred in the midst of the Watergate Scandal investigation, which Nixon was deeply embroiled in, bringing the presence of a number of protestors and hecklers, some of whom shouted "Jail to the Chief!

[27] Nations with an official presence at the fair included Australia, Canada, West Germany, Iran, Japan, Taiwan, Republic of Korea, the Philippines, the United States and the USSR.

[6]: 13  Architectural critics were intrigued[citation needed] by the Australian Pavilion with its 36 screen revolving audio visual platform and a model of the newly completed Sydney Opera House.

However, writer Calvin Trillin tartly commented that the exhibits of several other countries seemed designed to demonstrate their nation's lack of environmental care.

"While other world's fairs had introduced the telephone, the escalator, and the Belgian waffle, Spokane's Expo '74 would be associated forever with the 'institutionalized mea culpa,'" Trillin wrote in The New Yorker.

Inside the pavilion, visitors watched "Man Belongs to the Earth," a 23-minute IMAX film narrated by Chief Dan George and made for Expo by Paramount.

[36] Several sculptures created for the fair remain at Riverfront Park, including the Garbage Goat designed by the "welding nun" Paula Mary Turnbull.

The tent design itself with its heavy cables was not intended to stay up, however the people of Spokane voiced the opinion that it should remain as a unique architectural statement, and a monument to the 1974 exposition.