October 4, 1906 - 108 years-ago today, the statue of St. Louis atop Art Hill was unveiled & dedicated. Over 25,000 spectators turned out for the ceremony, which began at noon, & lasted until after dark. The statue was a gift to the city from the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Company, the firm responsible for staging the Worlds Fair two years earlier. Their President, David R. Francis, was a former St. Louis Mayor, & was also the only mayor of the city to have been elected Governor. In his speech, Francis made a plea for making the Art Museum a lasting monument to the Exposition, & called for $500,000 in donations to have it expanded. Then began the parade of city employees, including floats, several bands, fire-fighting equipment, & an asphalt roller. More than 1200 street department workers marched by with brooms on their shoulders, & just when it appeared to end, more than 700 policemen started making their way up the hill. The sun had set by the time the 5000 city workers passed, & what was left of the crowd moved closer as Jane Wells, daughter of the Mayor, pulled a cord to expose the Crusader-King, for whom the city was named. The statue, whose formal name is Apotheosis of St. Louis, was cast in bronze, & is an exact replica of the plaster statue which sat at the entrance to the Worlds Fair. (The present site of the Missouri History Museum) The statue served as the symbol of the city, until the Gateway Arch was built. In June, 1906, several months prior to the dedication, sculptor Charles Henry Niehaus filed a $125,000 lawsuit against The Louisiana Purchase Exposition Company, for casting an enlarged & enhanced version of his statue of St. Louis without his permission. Niehaus had offered to cast the temporary plaster sculpture of King Louis the IX of France in bronze for a $90,000 commission, but the job was given to a local firm, the W.R. Hodges Company, who did the job for $37,500. Settled out of court, Niehaus was awarded $3,000, & his name was engraved on the monuments base, as the statues designer. Through the years, stealing, & then returning the statues sword was an annual prank for students at nearby Washington University, until it was finally welded in place.
Posted on: Sat, 04 Oct 2014 05:03:04 +0000
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