Liberty Enlightening the World, known more commonly as the Statue of Liberty, is a statue given to the United States by France in the late 19th century, standing at Liberty Island in the mouth of the Hudson River in New York Harbor as a welcome to all returning Americans, visitors, and immigrants.
The copper statue, dedicated on October 28, 1886, commemorates the centennial of the United States and is a gesture of friendship between the two nations. The sculptor was Frederic Auguste Bartholdi; Gustave Eiffel, the designer of the Eiffel Tower, engineered the internal supporting structure. The Statue of Liberty is one of the most recognizable icons of the U.S. worldwide; in a more general sense, the statue represents liberty and escape from oppression. It is also a favored symbol of libertarians.
Description
The Statue of Liberty is located at 40.689, -74.045 on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, about 1.6 statute miles (2.6 km) southwest of the southern tip of Manhattan. The island was officially called "Bedloe's Island" until 1956, but has been popularly called "Liberty Island" since the early 1900s.
Lady Liberty holds a torch in her right hand and a tablet in her left. The tablet shows the caption JULY IV MDCCLXXVI—July 4, 1776, the date of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. One of her feet stands on chains. The seven spikes in the crown represent the seven seas or seven continents.
The height from ground to the top of the torch is 305 feet (93 m); this includes the foundation and the pedestal. The height of the statue itself, from the top of the base to the torch, is 151 feet (46 m). The statue weighs 204 tonnes and the pedestal weighs 24,500 tonnes.[1][2] The statue was built from thin copper plates hammered into wooden forms through a process known as repoussé. The formed plates were then mounted onto a steel skeleton.
A museum in the pedestal, accessible by elevator, presents the history of the statue. Inside the statue, a spiral stairway with rest seats at every third turn winds up to the observation deck in the crown. Before 1916, the ladder in the right arm holding the torch was open to the public, but it has for many years been restricted to staff use, for maintaining the lighting equipment in the torch. The interior of the statue has been closed to the public since 2001 (see below).
The poem "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, the winner of a contest underwritten by the New York World, was engraved on a bronze plaque in 1903, 20 years after it was written. The plaque is located on a wall of the museum, which is in the base of the statue. (It has never been engraved on the monument itself).
In its famous final lines, it says:
- Give me your tired, your poor,
- Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
- The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
- Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
- I lift my lamp beside the golden door!
Although Liberty Island is closer to New Jersey than to New York, it has been part of New York since the issuance in 1664 of the colonial charter that created New Jersey (see charter text). Portions of nearby Ellis Island that were formed by subsequent landfilling are, under a Supreme Court decision, part of New Jersey, but that decision had no effect on Liberty Island. The island is owned by the federal government and is administered by the National Park Service. (For additional details, see Liberty Island).
History
Unveiling of Statue of Liberty
French sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi was commissioned to design a sculpture with the year 1876 in mind for completion, to commemorate the centennial of the American Declaration of Independence. Bartholdi had previously prepared in 1869 a scale model of a giant statue of a lady holding a torch, for the entry of the recently built Suez Canal. The idea for the commemorative gift grew out of the political turmoil which was shaking France at the time. The French Third Republic was still considered as a "temporary" arrangement by many, who wished a return to monarchism, or to some form of constitutional dictatorship which they had known under Napoleon I of France. The idea of giving a colossal representation of republican virtues to a "sister" republic across the sea served as a focus for the republican cause against other political opponents.
Various sources cite different models for the face of the statue. One indicated the then-recently widowed Isabella Eugenie Boyer, the wife of Isaac Singer, the sewing-machine industrialist. "She was rid of the uncouth presence of her husband, who had left her with only his most socially desirable attributes: his fortune and... his children. She was, from the beginning of her career in Paris, a well-known figure. As the good-looking French widow of an American industrialist she was called upon to be Bartholdi's model for the Statue of Liberty." (Ruth Brandon, Singer and the Sewing Machine: A Capitalist Romance, p. 211) Another source believed that the "stern face" belonged to Bartholdi's mother, with whom he was very close. (Leslie Allen, "Liberty: The Statue and the American Dream," p. 21) National Geographic magazine also pointed to his mother, noting Bartholdi never denied nor explained the resemblance. (Alice J. Hall, "Liberty Lifts Her Lamp Once More," July 1986.)
Original torch, replaced in 1986.
It was agreed upon that in a joint effort the American people were to build the base, and the French people were responsible for the Statue and its assembly in the United States. However, lack of funds was a problem on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. In France, public fees, various forms of entertainment, and a lottery were among the methods used to raise the 2,250,000 francs. In the United States, benefit theatrical events, art exhibitions, auctions and prize fights assisted in providing needed funds. Meanwhile in France, Bartholdi required the assistance of an engineer to address structural issues associated with designing such a colossal copper sculpture. Gustave Eiffel (designer of the Eiffel Tower) was commissioned to design the massive iron pylon and secondary skeletal framework which allows the Statue's copper skin to move independently yet stand upright. Eiffel delegated the detailed work to his trusted structural engineer, Maurice Koechlin.
Back in America, the site, authorized in New York Harbor by Act of Congress, 1877, was selected by General William Tecumseh Sherman, who settled on Bartholdi's own choice, then known as Bedloe's Island, where there was already an early 19th century star-shaped fortification.
Fundraising for the pedestal, led by William M. Evarts, was going slowly, so Joseph Pulitzer (noted for the Pulitzer Prize) opened up the editorial pages of his newspaper, The World, to support the fund raising effort. Pulitzer used his newspaper to criticize both the rich who had failed to finance the pedestal construction and the middle class who were content to rely upon the wealthy to provide the funds. Pulitzer's campaign of harsh criticism was successful in motivating the people of America to donate.
Financing for the pedestal, designed by American architect Richard Morris Hunt, was completed in August 1885, the cornerstone was laid on August 5, and pedestal construction was finished in April 22, 1886. When the last stone of the pedestal was swung into place the masons reached into their pockets and showered into the mortar a collection of silver coins.
Built into the pedestal's massive masonry are two sets of four iron girders, connected by iron tie beams that are carried up to become part of Eiffel's framework for the statue itself. Thus Liberty is integral with her pedestal.
The Statue was completed in France in July, 1884 and arrived in New York Harbor on June 17, 1885 on board the French frigate Isere. In transit, the Statue was reduced to 350 individual pieces and packed in 214 crates. (The right arm and the torch, which were completed earlier, had been exhibited at the Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1876, and thereafter at Madison Square in New York City.) The Statue was re-assembled on her new pedestal in four months' time. On October 28, 1886, the dedication of the Statue of Liberty by U.S. President Grover Cleveland took place in front of thousands of spectators. She was a centennial gift ten years belated.
In 1916, the Black Tom Explosion caused $100,000 worth of damage to the statue, embedding shrapnel and eventually leading to restricting access of the torch to visitors. The same year, Gutzon Borglum, the sculptor of Mount Rushmore, modified the original copper torch by cutting away most of the copper in the flame, retrofitting glass panes and installing an internal light. After these modifications, the torch severely leaked rainwater and snowmelt, accelerating corrosion inside the statue.
President of the United States Franklin D. Roosevelt rededicated the Statue of Liberty on its 50th anniversary (October 28, 1936).
As with all historic areas administered by the National Park Service, Statue of Liberty National Monument, along with Ellis Island and Liberty Island, was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966.
In 1984, the Statue of Liberty was added to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization's list of World Heritage Sites. It is one of only four surviving man-made sites in the United States to be named as such, the others being Independence Hall, Pueblo de Taos, and the combined site of the University of Virginia and Monticello.
Liberty Centennial
In 1984, the statue was closed so that a $62 million renovation could be performed for the statue's centennial. Workers erected scaffolding around the statue, obscuring it from public view until the rededication on July 4, 1986. Inside work began with workers using liquid nitrogen to remove seven layers of paint applied to the interior of the copper skin over the decades. That left two layers of tar originally applied to plug leaks and prevent corrosion. Blasting with baking soda removed the tar without further damaging the copper. Larger holes in the copper skin had edges smoothed then mated with new copper patches.
Each of the 1,350 shaped iron ribs backing the skin had to be removed and replaced. The iron had experienced galvanic corrosion wherever it contacted the copper skin, losing up to 50% of its thickness. Bartholdi had anticipated the problem and used an asbestos/pitch combination to separate the metals, but the insulation had worn away decades before. New bars of stainless steel bent into matching shapes replaced the iron bars, with Teflon film separating them from the skin for further insulation and friction reduction.
The internal structure of the upraised right arm was reworked. The statue was erected with the arm offset 18" (0.46m) to the right and forward of Eiffel's central frame, while the head was offset 24" (0.61m) to the left, which compromised the framework. Theory held that Bartholdi made the modification without Eiffel's involvement after seeing the arm and head were too close. Engineers considered reinforcements made in 1932 insufficient and added diagonal bracing in 1984 and 1986 to make the arm structurally sound.
A new torch replaced the original, which was deemed beyond repair because of the extensive 1916 modifications. The 1886 torch is now located in the monument's lobby museum. The new torch has gold leaf applied to the exterior of the "flame," which is illuminated by external lamps on the surrounding balcony platform. Upgraded climate control systems and two elevators (one to the top of the pedestal and a small emergency elevator to the crown) were added. The Statue of Liberty was reopened to the public on July 5 1986.
Jeanne Fleming produced the centennial extravaganza, which lasted three days, drew 12 million people, and is said to have been the largest public event in the world as of that date.
After 9/11
Until September 11, 2001, the statue was open to visitors, who arrived by ferry and could climb stairs into her crown, which provided a broad view of New York Harbor.
The statue and island were closed from September 11, 2001 to August 3, 2004 due to security concerns following the destruction of the World Trade Center. Currently, the museum and ten-story pedestal are open for visitation. The interior of the statue remains closed, although a glass ceiling in the pedestal allows for views of Eiffel's iron framework.
Visitors are subject to restrictions, including personal searches similar to the security found in airports.
Origin of the copper
Statue of Liberty embellished by golden sunset
Historical records make no mention of the source of the copper used in the Statue of Liberty. In the town of Visnes, near Stavanger, Norway, tradition holds that the copper came from the French-owned Visnes Mine. Ore from this mine, refined in France and Belgium, was a significant source of European copper in the late nineteenth century. In 1985, Bell Laboratories used emission spectrography to compare samples of copper from the Visnes Mines and from the Statue of Liberty, found the spectrum of impurities to be very similar, and concluded that the evidence argued strongly for a Norwegian origin of the copper.
Jumps
On 2:45 p.m. on February 2, 1912, steeplejack Frederick R. Law successfully performed a parachute jump from the observation platform surrounding the torch. It was done with the permission of the army captain administering the island. The New York Times reported that he "fell fully seventy-five feet like a dead weight, the parachute showing no inclination whatsoever to open at first," but he then descended "gracefully," landed hard, and limped away.[3]
The first suicide took place on May 13, 1929. The New York Times reported a witness as saying the man, later identified as Ralph Gleason, crawled out through one of the windows of the crown, turned around as if to return, "seemed to slip" and "shot downward, bouncing off the breast of the statue in the plunge." The body landed at a patch of grass at the base, just a few feet from a workman who was mowing the grass.[4]
Replicas
Full-scale replica of the statue's face.
A smaller-scale copy of the Statue of Liberty is found in Paris, France, where it stands near the Grenelle Bridge on the Île des Cygnes, an island in the river Seine (48°51′0″N, 2°16′47″E). It looks towards the Atlantic Ocean and hence towards its "larger sister" in New York Harbor (it was featured in the Harrison Ford movie Frantic).
From 1887 to 1945, Hanoi was home to another copy of the statue. Measuring 2.85 m tall, it was erected by the French colonial government after being sent from France for an exhibition. It was known to locals unaware of its history as Tượng Bà đầm xòe (Statue of the Open-Dress Dame). When the French lost control of French Indochina during World War II, the statue was toppled on August 1, 1945 after being deemed a vestige of the colonial government along with other statues erected by the French. [5]
From 1902 to 2002, visitors to Midtown Manhattan were occasionally disoriented by what seemed to be an impossibly nearby view of the statue. They were seeing a 37 foot (11 m) high replica located at 43 West 64th Street atop the Liberty Warehouse.[6] In February 2002 the statue was removed by the building owners to allow building expansion.[7] It was donated to the Brooklyn Museum of Art which installed it in its sculpture garden on October 2005, and plans to restore it on site in spring of 2006.[8][9]
Duluth, Minnesota has a small copy on the west side of the Duluth Entertainment Convention Center, in the center of a clearing surrounded by pine trees where it may be passed unnoticed. It was presented to the city by some of Bartholdi's descendants residing in Duluth.[10][11]
Between 1949 and 1951, approximately two hundred 100-inch (2.5 m) replicas of the statue, made of stamped copper, were purchased by Boy Scout troops and donated to various towns in the United States. The mass-produced statues are not great art nor meticulously accurate (a conservator notes that "her face isn’t as mature as the real Liberty. It’s rounder and more like a little girl’s"), but they are cherished, particularly since 9/11. Many have been lost or destroyed, but preservationists have been able to account for about a hundred of them, and BSA Troop 101 of Cheyenne, Wyoming has collected photographs of over 50 of them.[12][13]
There is a half-size replica at the New York-New York Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, Nevada (see photo). A 35 meter copy is found in the German theme park Heidepark Soltau, located on a lake with cruising Mississippi steamboats.[citation needed]
The Statue of Liberty copy on the river Seine in Paris, France. Given to the city in 1885, it faces west, towards the original Liberty in New York Harbor.
Another replica is the Bordeaux Statue of Liberty. This 2.5 meter (8 ft) statue is found in the city of Bordeaux in Southwest France . The first Bordeaux statue was taken down and melted by the Nazis in World War II. The statue was replaced in 2000 and a plaque was added to commemorate the victims of the September 11 terrorist attacks. On the night of March 25, 2003, unknown vandals poured red paint and gasoline on the replica and set it on fire. The vandals also cracked the pedestal of the plaque honoring victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. The mayor of Bordeaux, former prime minister Alain Juppé, condemned the attack. There is another good replica in Northwest of France, in the small town of Barentin near Rouen. It was made for a French movie, Le Cerveau ("the brain"), directed by Gérard Oury and featuring actors Jean-Paul Belmondo and Bourvil.[citation needed]
A bronze sculpture of the Statue of Liberty is on display in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York city.[citation needed]
The city of Sioux Falls, South Dakota erected a replacement bronze reproduction standing 9 feet (2.7 m) tall in McKennan Park atop the original pedestal for a long-missing wooden replica.[14]
The "Goddess of Democracy"
During the Tiananmen Square protest of 1989, Chinese student demonstrators in Beijing built a 10 m image called the Goddess of Democracy, which sculptor Tsao Tsing-yuan said was intentionally dissimilar to the Statue of Liberty to avoid being "too openly pro-American."
In Japan, a small Statue of Liberty is also a well-known symbol of the Amerika-mura (American Village) shopping district in Osaka, Japan. Another replica 'Jiyuu no Megami' (自由の女神, lit. 'Goddess of Freedom', the Japanese name for the Statue) stands near the only beach in Tokyo at Odaiba.[citation needed]
A 12 meter replica of the Statue of Liberty in Colmar, the city of Bartholdi's birth, was dedicated on July 4, 2004 to commemorate the 100th anniversary of his death. It stands at the north entrance of the city[15][16] The Bartholdi Museum in Colmar contains numerous models of various sizes made by Bartholdi during the process of designing the statue.[17]
A smaller replica is standing in the Norwegian village of Visnes, where the copper used in the original statue was mined from.[citation needed]
A small replica also stands in Mountain Brook, a suburb of Birmingham, Alabama.[18][19][20]
A replica stands atop the Hotel Victory in Prishtina, Kosovo.[21]
Two 12 meter replicas stand atop the Liberty Building in Buffalo, New York, nearly 108 meters above street level.[citation needed]
A 25-foot-tall replica sits on an abandoned Susquehanna River railroad-bridge platform in the Dauphin Narrows of Susquehanna River at Harrisburg. The replica was originally built by a local activist Gene Stilp on July 2, 1986; it was made of venetian blinds and stood 18 feet tall. Six years later, after it was destroyed in a windstorm, it was rebuilt by Stilp and other local citizens, of wood, metal, glass and fiberglass, to a height of 25 feet.[22][23][24]
A LEGO replica of the Statue of Liberty consisting of 2882 bricks and standing 90cm is a popular sculpture among LEGO enthusiasts. The statue went out of production, but due to popular demand was returned to sale.(See External links below).[25]
The Statue of Liberty in popular culture
- Main article: List of movie appearances of the Statue of Liberty
- During the 1940s and 1950s, the iconography of science fiction in the United States was filled with images of ancient, decayed Statues of Liberty, set in the distant future. The covers of famous pulp magazines such as Amazing Stories and Astounding Science Fiction all featured Lady Liberty at one time, surrounded by ruins or by the sediments of the ages, as curious aliens or representatives of advanced or degenerate humans of the future gazed upon her remains. The February 1941 cover of Astounding showed a primitive man and woman approaching on a raft a Statue of Liberty surrounded by wild growth.
- In 1978, at University of Wisconsin-Madison, Jim Mallon and Leon Varjian of the "Pail and Shovel Party" won election by promising to give campus issues "the seriousness they deserve." In 1979 (and again in 1980), they created their own version of the Planet of the Apes scene by erecting replicas of the torch and the top of the head on the frozen surface of Lake Mendota, creating a fanciful suggestion that the entire statue was standing on the bottom of the lake.[26][27]
- At the end of Men in Black II, Tommy Lee Jones' character utilizes the Statue's torch to erase the memory of tan alien spacecraft from the minds of thousands of New Yorkers.
- Much of the advertising for the film The Day After Tomorrow (2004) used an image of the Statue of Liberty nearly buried in snow and ice (much like the University of Wisconsin "Pail and Shovel Party" prank), after a storm surge and catastrophic climate change. In this image, the Statue of Liberty is facing the wrong way - West towards New Jersey, with the New York skyline to its right.
- The 1995 film Batman Forever featured a clone of the Statue in the harbor of the fictitious Gotham City. A helicopter operated by Tommy Lee Jones' villain character "Two Face" was intentionally flown into the false Statue in an effort to destroy Batman in the film's opening scene.
- The first level of the 2000 computer game Deus Ex takes place on Liberty Island and inside the statue pedestal. In the sequel Deus Ex: Invisible War, the last level is again at the statue, which has been re-erected as a light sculpture.
- In the computer game Command & Conquer: Red Alert 2 when playing as the allies on the first campaign mission the opening scene shows Russian forces attacking and destroying the Statue of Liberty.
- On April 8, 1983, CBS broadcast a program, the fifth of a series featuring illusionist David Copperfield, in which he made the statue apparently vanish. The effect took place at night. The program showed the statue from the point of view of an audience seated on a ground-level platform, viewing the statue through a proscenium arch. According to William Poundstone, the illusion involved closing curtains fitted in the arch; turning off the statue's floodlights; and slowly rotating the platform on which the audience was sitting. In a literal example of misdirection, the now dim, but not quite invisible, statue was no longer aligned with the arch. Thus, when the curtains were opened, the arch now framed darkness. Televised views from a helicopter showing the statue's "disappearance" were, according to Poundstone, views of a duplicate ring of lights, surrounding empty ground, that had been installed on Liberty Island for the illusion.[28]
A fiction rendition of
Adolf Hitler visiting the Statue of Liberty.
- The album cover of Supertramp's Breakfast in America show a rendering of the downtown New York skyline made from egg cartons, coffee mugs, and other dining utensils. In the foreground a waitress with a name tag reading "Libby" - holds a glass of orange juice on a saucer in her outstretched right hand, and a menu in her left, as she mimics the statue's pose.
- In the 2 parter season 4 episodes of Star Trek: Enterprise, Storm Front, there is an alternate timeline where the eastern side of the United States is conquered by the Germans, with the aid of aliens. The opening teaser of part 2, shows a propaganda news reel which shows footage of Adolf Hitler visiting New York, and the Statue of Liberty, where he is given the key to the city.[30]
See also
References
- Holdstcok., Robert. editor Encyclopedia of Science Fiction. Londo: Octopus books, 1978.
- Vidal, Pierre. Frédéric-Auguste bartholdi 1834-1904: Par la Main, par l'Esprit. Paris: Les créations du pélican, 2000.
- Smith, V. Elaine, "Engineering Miss Liberty's Rescue." Popular Science, June 1986, page 68.
- ↑ Feuerstein, Gary, personal web page: Statue of Liberty Facts (weight of statue and pedestal)
- ↑ National Park Service (1954): Dimensions of the Statue: "Weight of copper used in statue, 200,000 pounds (100 tons); Weight of steel used in statue, 250,000 pounds (125 tons)l Total weight of statue, 450,000 pounds (225 tons)"
- ↑ "Parachute Leap Off Statue of Liberty; Steeplejack Had First Thought of Jumping Off the Singer Building. Steers With His Harms And Lands Safely on Stone Coping 30 Feet from Water's Edge—He Won't Talk About It." The New York Times, February 3, 1912, p. 4
- ↑ "Youth Plunges Off Statue of Liberty Crown, 200 Feet High, in First Suicide at That Spot." The New York Times, May 14, 1929, p. 1
- ↑ Vietnam Net article (Hanoi replica: in Vietnamese, with pictures)
- ↑ Little Liberty – photographs and descriptions
- ↑ Statue of Liberty—Liberty Warehouse – description, news item on statue's relocation
- ↑ http://www.brooklynmuseum.org/press/pr/2005_08_statue_of_liberty.pdf Brooklyn Museum to Install Monumental Statue of Liberty Replica], August, 2005 Brooklyn Museum press release
- ↑ Brooklyn Museum Nov-Dec 2005 "What's Happening" "recently installed" and "in the Spring of 2006 will undergo restoration on site in its new location."
- ↑ Listing in guide to public art (Deluth replica)
- ↑ Photograph in an online forum (Duluth replica)
- ↑ Restoring the Little Sisters of Lady Liberty, article in American Profile
- ↑ BSA Troop 101, Cheyenne, Wyoming Photos and locations of more than fifty of the replicas
- ↑ Statue of Liberty unveiling, Sioux Falls Parks and Recreation news
- ↑ http://www.endex.com/gf/buildings/liberty/worldstatues/liberties/Colmar/LibertyColmar.htm Statue of Freedom], Colmar, Alsace, France, Birthplace of Auguste Bartholdi. Gary Feuerstein, personal website
- ↑ Another Statue of Liberty, Colmar, France. Internationalliving.com website.
- ↑ Construction of the Statue, National Park Service Historical Handbook <!--Caution: this is an old book; is it up-to-date?
- ↑ (Website's, authorship unclear) Birmingham's Statue of Liberty With photos.
- ↑ Roadside America website: Birmingham, Alabama - Statue of Liberty Replica Three user comments. Gives address as "516 Liberty Pkwy., Birmingham, AL"
- ↑ Google Maps satellite image of Birmingham replica, 33.4822212 N -86.706902W
- ↑ Smith, Morgan (2003) "Investors should take a closer look at Kosovo," Denver Business Journal, July 25, 2003[1]: "it was quite a change to arrive in Pristina, where the main street is named after Bill Clinton and my hotel, the Hotel Victory, has a replica of the Statue of Liberty built on its rooftop."
- ↑ Scolforo, Mark, 2004, Master of props lends visual effects to memorable publicity campaigns, Associated Press
- ↑ U. S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Susquehanna River Trail, "Dauphin Narrows/Statue of Liberty"
- ↑ R. Craig Kochel, personal website, image of the Stilp statue[2]
- ↑ LEGO Set Reference Lego replica
- ↑ Lady Liberty on Lake Mendota, pictures of the University of Wisconsin prank
- ↑ Image of Lake Mendota prank
- ↑ Poundstone, William (1986), Bigger Secrets, Boston, Houghton Mifflin, ISBN 039538477X: Description of Copperfield illusion.
- ↑ New York Liberty website, showing Statue of Liberty in logo. Note that the team's mascot is not the statue, but a dog, named Maddie after Madison Square Garden.
- ↑ Memory Alpha link,[3] Star Trek Enterprise episode Season 4, Episode 02: Storm Front pt 2.
External links
Some resources in French
Other links
Coordinates: 40°41′21″N, 74°02′40″W
The content of this page is retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Statue_of_Liberty under GFDL
