Benjamin Chambers writes:
What did the future look like back in 1964? Here’s a clue: this rather puzzling cartoon by Alan Dunn (click to see it full-size) from the October 3, 1964 issue of The New Yorker.

Judging from the globe in the background, you probably could find phone booths like the one drawn here at the 1964 New York World’s Fair. So far, so good. But what the heck is the kid riding in, and what’s so funny about the cartoon?
As to the first question, the Complete New Yorker index describes the kid as sitting in an “automobile pushcart.” Perhaps these were commonly available at the World’s Fair, perhaps not—but I don’t think it’s supposed to attract our attention. Instead, the kid’s dismayed look tells us what’s funny: the phone booth itself.
No doubt such booths were a radical departure from the full-size, glassed-in phone booths typical of the period, an intimation of the future. (Though those were not as ubiquitous as I thought. According to “this advertisement”:http://www.phonebooth.org/phoneadverts/portrait_of_a_city.html posted by the folks at “The Phonebooth”:http://www.phonebooth.org/index.html, the first outdoor telephone booths weren’t installed in Manhattan until around 1960.) Is it possible that the joke here is simply that the kid can’t see his mother? Your ideas welcome.
[UPDATE: I’ve gotten a lot of useful information from commenters and elsewhere that throws some light on the cartoon, so I’ll collate it here. First, thanks to Marc Francisco of www.phonebooth.org, who sent me this photo from a Bell System press release:

According to him, the copy read, “A pretty World’s Fair visitor makes a call from a Serpentine booth, so called because of its unique serpent-like design. All booths on the Fairgrounds are equipped with the Bell System’s newly developed Touch-Tone service which speeds calling by push buttons instead of a dial.”
(Touch-Tone! Another intimation of the future!) Note that the “pretty visitor” is wearing pumps, like the woman in the cartoon. No kid in a pushcart, though. Perhaps “she’s calling the operator”:http://www.phonebooth.org/phoneadverts/full_of_bees.html to find out where he went.
Then Bill Cotter sent a link to a shot of the booths “in use”:http://www.worldsfairphotos.com/nywf64/phones.htm at the time of the Fair, as well as a photo “explaining”:http://www.worldsfairphotos.com/nywf64/hertz.htm the kid’s “pushcart”. Thanks also to Mike for sending another link to photos of the booths at the time of The Fair, and several shots of them in their current state of “tragic disrepair”:http://64nywf65.20m.com/Booth/Booth.htm. He’s got more to say in his comment below …
Finally, for those of you astonished to learn that outdoor phone booths weren’t installed in Manhattan until about 1960—where did Superman change clothes when he was outside?—this ad from 1955 suggests they came late (?!) to Manhattan.]
In the same issue, too, I accidentally ran across an ad for perfume that was so modern, it jumped off the page (click for larger size):

Compare it to these two ads, one for perfume, and the other for makeup, taken from the same issue, that exemplify the competition (click for larger size):


By comparison, the ad for the Fabergé perfume stands out, doesn’t it? Unlike the other two, it’s selling a feeling, an impression of carnality, rather than features (“the modern way to carry spray,” “glides on easily”). It’s like an ad for, well, the future.
Often, though, the future has been around for longer than we think. Lycra® (generic name: “Spandex”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spandex) is a case in point. I always thought that it was a relatively recent invention. Turns out I’m wrong: it was invented in 1959. Didn’t take long to get it to market, either, evidently. Check out this ad featuring it from the February 3, 1962 issue of TNY:

Still, I’ll bet you not one Beatles fan who saw this ad suspected that “hair bands” were already a foregone conclusion…