Description:

Bartholdi Frederic

New York City Hall hosts Statue of Liberty party


Handsome printed invitation on cream colored stock card inviting recipient to attend City Hall reception. With striking image at top depicting Statue of Liberty in grisaille flanked by French and American flags in color above the caption "Excelsior." A tricolored fabric ribbon stamped with gilt silhouette of Statue of Liberty appears at left. In near fine condition, measuring 8" x 4.75." Isolated light grime at edges recto, with mounting traces verso.


"The Common Council of the City of New York requests the honor of your company at the ceremonies attending the reception of the Bartholdi Statue of Liberty at the City Hall, Monday, June 15th 1885 at one o'clock P.M."


The event committee, here called the "Committee of Arrangements", consisted of six New York City politicians including the city's mayor William Russell Grace (1832-1904), and the acting President of the Board of Aldermen, Adolph L. Sanger (1842-1894).


This invitation to a city function prior to the Statue's actual arrival illustrated the intense excitement and anticipation surrounding its delivery. The Statue, disassembled into three hundred modeled copper sheets carefully packed in crates, was transported in the hold of the 1,000-ton steam-propelled French man-of-war ship Isere. The French naval flagship Flore escorted Isere on its month-long transatlantic crossing from France.


The French ships arrived outside of New York Harbor on June 17th, and reached Bedloe's Island two days later. The Americans warmly received the French ships with cannon salutes; ceremonial visits and sponsored events continued well into July 1885. Yet despite the festive atmosphere, delays in pedestal construction meant that even with the sculpture now in New York, it would not be inaugurated until over sixteen months later in October 1886.


Statue of Liberty sculptor Frederic-Auguste Bartholdi (1834-1904) studied painting, sculpture, and architecture under well-known instructors like Viollet-le-Duc in Paris. Following his service in the Franco-Prussian War, Bartholdi became increasingly interested in sculpting monumental works celebrating resistance against oppression, and Enlightenment ideals like Freedom. Bartholdi later designed the “Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World”. The fundraising phase of this process would long surpass the actual 100th anniversary of the United States. Yet once it was installed in New York in 1886, the massive 151-ft tall copper-clad sculpture of a standing woman would fundamentally change the cityscape.


The decision to display the Statue of Liberty in New York was quite a coup, since other cities, like Boston and Philadelphia, had also expressed interest in housing the monumental work. It was thus with extreme city pride that New York City Mayor Grace, President of the Board of Aldermen Sanger, and the remaining twenty-four city aldermen celebrated the imminent arrival of the Statue of Liberty in the spring of 1885!


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