| Statue of Francis Scott Key | |
|---|---|
 The monument in 2016 | |
 | |
| Year | 1888 |
| Subject | Francis Scott Key |
| Location | San Francisco, California, U.S. |
| 37°46′17″N122°28′00″W / 37.77126°N 122.46664°W | |
A memorial statue of Francis Scott Key stood in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, in the U.S. state of California, from 1888 until 2020.
The monument to Francis Scott Key was commissioned by San Francisco businessman James Lick, who donated some $60,000 for a sculpture of Key to be raised in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park. [1] The nation's first memorial to Key, it consisted of a sculpture of the seated Key, within a travertine monument displaying text from "The Star-Spangled Banner", and surmounted by a statue of Columbia and four eagles. [1] It was executed by sculptor William W. Story in Rome during 1885–1887, transported to San Francisco, and unveiled on July 4, 1888, near a new music stand. [1] [2]
In the San Francisco earthquake of 1906, the monument was damaged and, when repaired, it was re-erected in a more prominent position in the park, on the south side of the Music Concourse. In 1967 it was dismantled and taken into storage to allow further expansion of the nearby California Academy of Sciences. When restored to public view, on July 4, 1977, it was placed in yet another location, at the eastern end of the Music Concourse. [1] In the 2010s, the city of San Francisco completed a $140,000 renovation of the Key monument. [1]
The statue was toppled by vandals on June 19, 2020, in the wake of the murder of George Floyd. [3] [4] A year later, on Juneteenth 2021, sculptor Dana King unveiled Monumental Reckoning, comprising 350 sculptures which now encircle the plinth of the empty monument. These 4 feet (1.2 meters) high sculptures represent the first Africans kidnapped from their homeland in Angola and sold into chattel slavery in Virginia in 1619. [5] [6] The words "Lift Every Voice" were also installed above the Spreckels Temple of Music in honor of the civil rights activist James Weldon Johnson, author of "Lift Every Voice and Sing", a hymn often referred to as the "Black national anthem". [7] [8]
Francis Scott Key was an American lawyer, author, and poet from Frederick, Maryland, best known as the author of the text of the American national anthem "The Star-Spangled Banner". Key observed the British bombardment of Fort McHenry in 1814 during the War of 1812. He was inspired upon seeing the American flag still flying over the fort at dawn and wrote the poem "Defence of Fort M'Henry"; it was published within a week with the suggested tune of the popular song "To Anacreon in Heaven". The song with Key's lyrics became known as "The Star-Spangled Banner" and slowly gained in popularity as an unofficial anthem, finally achieving official status as the national anthem more than a century later under President Herbert Hoover.
Golden Gate Park is an urban park between the Richmond and Sunset districts of San Francisco, California, United States. It is the largest park in the city, containing 1,017 acres (412 ha), and the third-most visited urban park in the United States, with an estimated 24 million visitors annually.
Mount Olivet Cemetery is a cemetery in Frederick, Maryland. The cemetery is located at 515 South Market Street and is operated by the Mount Olivet Cemetery Company, Inc.
Dana King is an American broadcast journalist and sculptor. She served as an anchor for the CBS owned-and-operated station KPIX-TV in San Francisco. In 2012, King left KPIX to pursue her passion in sculpting and art. Her outdoor sculpture commemorating the Montgomery bus boycott is displayed at the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama. King uses historically generalized and racist ideas that require in-depth researches, to provide information on the normative misrepresentation of Black peoples' emotional and physical sacrifices.
The Music Concourse is an open-air plaza within Golden Gate Park in San Francisco. Flanking the oval-shaped concourse are the M. H. de Young Memorial Museum and the California Academy of Sciences.
Robert Emmet is a bronze statue of Robert Emmet by Jerome Connor. There are four examples: Massachusetts Avenue and 24th Street, N.W. Washington, D.C.; St Stephen's Green, Dublin; Golden Gate Park, San Francisco; Emmetsburg, Iowa.
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A bronze statue of Abraham Lincoln by George Fite Waters was installed in Portland, Oregon's South Park Blocks, in the United States, until 2020. The 10-foot statue was donated by Henry Waldo Coe.
A 1926–27 statue of George Washington by Italian American artist Pompeo Coppini was installed in northeast Portland, Oregon, United States. The bronze sculpture was the second of three statues of Washington by the artist, following a similar statue installed in Mexico City in 1912 and preceding another installed on the University of Texas at Austin campus in February 1955. The Portland statue was created to commemorate the 1926 sesquicentennial of the Declaration of Independence and dedicated in 1927. It was part of the City of Portland and Multnomah County Public Art Collection. In June 2020, it was toppled by protestors.
A bronze sculpture of American pioneer, newspaper editor and historian Harvey W. Scott (1838–1910) by Gutzon Borglum, sometimes called Harvey Scott or Harvey W. Scott, was installed on Mount Tabor in Portland, Oregon, United States, until being toppled in October 2020.
A statue of Charles Linn was previously installed in Birmingham, Alabama's Linn Park, in the United States. The statue was erected in 2012 and toppled in 2020.
A 30-foot (9.1 m) tall statue of Junípero Serra was installed in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, in the U.S. state of California. It had first been erected in 1907 and sculpted by Douglas Tilden. The memorial was toppled on June 19, 2020, during the George Floyd protests, as a Juneteenth commemoration. The next day another memorial for Serra was torn down in Los Angeles at Father Serra Park by about five dozen indigenous activists. Other statues of Junípero Serra were involved as the protests expanded to include monuments of individuals associated with the controversy over the genocide of indigenous peoples in the Americas. Demonstrators also toppled or otherwise vandalized the statues of Francis Scott Key, Ulysses S. Grant, and a group consisting of Don Quixote and his companion, Sancho Panza, kneeling to honor their creator, Cervantes.
A bronze bust of Ulysses S. Grant was installed in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park, in the U.S. state of California, in 1896 and removed in 2020. The original sculptor of the bust was a renowned German born sculptor by the name of Rupert Schmid who had been noted for his commissioned work including The Progress of Civilization, a memorial arch at Stanford University before it was toppled in an earthquake in 1906.
The Women's Rights Pioneers Monument is a sculpture by Meredith Bergmann. It was installed in Central Park, Manhattan, New York City, on August 26, 2020. The sculpture is located at the northwest corner of Literary Walk along The Mall, the widest pedestrian path in Central Park. The sculpture commemorates and depicts Sojourner Truth, Susan B. Anthony (1820–1906), and Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902), pioneers in the suffrage movement who advocated women's right to vote and who were pioneers of the larger movement for women's rights.
Orpheus with the Awkward Foot is a monumental statue located at Fort McHenry in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. The monument, designed by sculptor Charles Henry Niehaus, was commissioned by the United States Commission of Fine Arts to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the writing of "The Star-Spangled Banner", written by Francis Scott Key during the Battle of Baltimore in 1814. The statue was dedicated in 1922, with U.S. President Warren G. Harding in attendance.
The William McKinley Memorial is a statue honoring the assassinated United States President William McKinley. It stands at the foot of Panhandle Park, San Francisco, California, and faces the DMV across Baker Street. Created by Robert Ingersoll Aitken (1878–1949) in 1904, the Monument was dedicated in 1903 by President Theodore Roosevelt, who succeeded McKinley after his assassination in 1901. The monument was unveiled on November 24, 1904 at the entrance to the Golden Gate Park panhandle. Over 5,000 people came to the unveiling. Speeches were made by former Mayor James D. Phelan, Mayor Eugene Schmitz, John McNaught, and others.
The Monumento a los Constructores, also known as the Monumento a los Constructores de la Ciudad, is a partly-destroyed outdoor bronze monument installed along Acueducto Avenue, in the historic center of Morelia, Michoacán, Mexico. The artwork was created by José Luis Padilla Retana and was unveiled in May 1995 in honor of those who built the city.
