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Belgium under Baudouin – King: 17 July 1951 – 31 July 1993
Brussels World’s Fair Commemorative
1958 Silver 50 Francs (50 Frank) 30mm (12.47 grams) 0.835 Silver (0.3334 oz.
ASW)
Reference: KM# 150.1 | Designer: Carlos van Dionant
The Town Hall of the City of Brussels municipality
World’s Fair, The Town Hall of the City of Brussels municipality divides date
from denomination.
You are bidding on the exact item pictured,
provided with a Certificate of Authenticity and Lifetime Guarantee of
Authenticity.
available for sale in my storeall coins of BelgiumClick here to see
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Baudouin
or Boudewijn (7 September 1930 – 31 July 1993) reigned as
King of the Belgians
, following his father’s
abdication, from 1951 until his death in 1993. He was the eldest son of
King Leopold III
(1901–83) and his first wife,
Princess
Astrid of Sweden
(1905–35).
Because he had no children with his wife,
Queen Fabiola of Belgium
, the Crown passed to
his younger brother,
King Albert II of the Belgians
(formerly
Prince of Liège
), following his death.
He was a maternal first cousin of
King Harald V of Norway
,
Princess Astrid of Norway
, and
Princess Ragnhild of Norway
.
Baudouin is the French form of his name, the form most commonly used
outside Belgium; his Dutch name is Boudewijn. (The English equivalent is
Baldwin
.)
Expo 58, also known as the
Brussels World’s Fair
(Dutch:
Brusselse Wereldtentoonstelling,
French
:
Exposition Universelle et Internationale de
Bruxelles), was held from 17 April to 19 October 1958.[1]
It was the first major
World’s Fair
after World War II
.
The Town Hall
of the
City of Brussels
municipality
Background
Nearly 15,000 workers spent three years building the 2 km2 (490
acres) site on the
Heysel
plateau, 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) northwest of
central Brussels
,
Belgium
.
Many of the buildings were re-used from the
Brussels International
Exposition of 1935
, which had been held on the same site.
Every 25 years starting in 1855, Belgium had staged large national events to
celebrate its national independence following the
Belgian Revolution
of 1830. However, the Belgian government under prime minister
Achille Van Acker
decided to forego celebrations in 1955 to have additional funding for the 1958
Expo.
Expo 58 was the 11th World’s Fair hosted by Belgium, and the fifth in
Brussels, following the fairs in 1888, 1897, 1910 and 1935. Since Expo 58,
Belgium has not arranged any more world fairs.
Exhibition
The site is best known for the
Atomium
,
a giant model of a unit cell of an iron crystal (each sphere representing an
atom). More than 41
million visitors visited the site, which was opened with a call for world peace
and social and economic progress, issued by
King Baudouin I
.
Notable exhibitions include the
Philips Pavilion
,
where “Poème
électronique“, commissioned specifically for the location, was
played back from 425 loudspeakers, placed at specific points as designed by
Iannis Xenakis
,
and Le Corbusier
.[citation
needed]
Another exhibition at the Belgian pavilion was the Congolese village that
some have branded a
human zoo
.
 Belgium,
officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a
sovereign state
in
Western Europe
. It is a small, densely
populated country which covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres
(11,787 sq mi) and has a population of about 11 million people.
Straddling the cultural boundary between
Germanic
and
Latin Europe
, Belgium is home to two main
linguistic groups: the
Dutch
-speaking, mostly
Flemish
community, which constitutes about 59%
of the population, and the
French
-speaking, mostly
Walloon
population, which comprises 41% of all
Belgians. Additionally, there is a small group of
German
-speakers who live in the
East Cantons
located around the
High Fens
area, and bordering Germany.
Belgium
is a federal
constitutional monarchy
with a
parliamentary system
of governance. It is
divided into three regions and three communities, that exist next to each other.
Its two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of
Flanders
in the north and the French-speaking
southern region of
Wallonia
. The
Brussels-Capital Region
, officially bilingual,
is a mostly French-speaking
enclave
within the Flemish Region. A
German-speaking Community
exists in eastern
Wallonia. Belgium’s linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are
reflected in its
political history
and complex
system of government
.
Historically, Belgium, the
Netherlands
and
Luxembourg
were known as the
Low Countries
; it once covered a somewhat
larger area than the current
Benelux
group of states. The region was called
Belgica in Latin, after the
Roman province
of
Gallia Belgica
. From the end of the
Middle Ages
until the 17th century, the area of
Belgium was a prosperous and cosmopolitan centre of commerce and culture. From
the 16th century until the
Belgian Revolution
in 1830, when Belgium
seceded from the
Netherlands
, the area of Belgium served as the
battleground between many European powers, causing it to be dubbed the
“Battlefield of Europe,” a reputation strengthened by both
world wars
.
Upon its independence, Belgium participated in the
Industrial Revolution
and, during the course of
the 20th century, possessed a number of
colonies in Africa
. The second half of the 20th
century was marked by rising tensions between the Dutch-speaking and the
French-speaking citizens fueled by
differences in language
and the
unequal economic development
of Flanders and
Wallonia. This continuing antagonism has led to several
far-reaching reforms
, resulting in a transition
from a unitary to a federal arrangement during the period from 1970 to 1993.
Despite the reforms, tensions between the groups remain; the formation of a
coalition government took 18 months following the June 2010 federal election.
Belgium is a founding member of the
European Union
,
Eurozone
,
NATO,
OECD
and
WTO
, and a part of the trilateral
Benelux
Union. Its capital, Brussels, hosts
several of the EU’s official seats as well as the headquarters of many major
international organizations such as
NATO. Belgium is also a part of the
Schengen Area
.
Belgium is a
developed country
, with an advanced high-income
economy and is categorized as “very high” in the
Human Development Index
.
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