Here’s what you’ll learn when you read this story:
- The Statue of Liberty was the work of French sculptor Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi.
- For more than a century, people have wondered about the model Bartholdi used for Lady Liberty.
- Historical records indicate the sculptor drew inspiration from Ancient Egypt and his mother.
When Liberty Enlightening the World arrived in New York Harbor on June 17, 1885, the statue didn’t yet have a pedestal on which to stand. It wasn’t until more than a year later, when the statue more commonly known as “The Statue of Liberty,” would be put in place.
To celebrate its dedication on October 28, 1886, one million New Yorkers attended parades both on land and water. This was no surprise to the sculptor, Frenchman Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi. He had selected the site on which she would stand specifically because people on every entering ship would see the statue. Bartholdi called this location, now known as Liberty Island, the “gateway to America.”
Despite her wait for a home, both American and French citizens had seen parts of the Statue of Liberty for at least a decade before her placement. The arm holding the torch was shown at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, while her head and shoulders were displayed at the 1878 Paris Universal Exposition.
Whether in parts or in her entirety, the mysterious woman with a 3-foot-8-inch nose and 2-foot-6-inch eyes looked familiar to many Americans. However, her origin story wasn’t well known. Early on, people wondered whose face had become the personification of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Even 100 years after the arrival of the Statue of Liberty—and after the information was readily available—the internet became rife with claims that its true model was a woman whose first husband was one of America’s great inventors and her second husband was European royalty. Alas, this isn’t the case, but the true story does involve ancient history and strong family ties to the sculptor.
Decades before he began to sketch his most famous work, Bartholdi researched the Colossus of Rhodes, a statue believed to be over 100 feet tall and considered one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. He looked to the Colossus for inspiration when he hoped to design a statue for the entrance to the Suez Canal in Port Said, Egypt. His plan was to sculpt a robed female bearing a torch to guide ships. Bartholdi called this statue, which was never built, Egypt Carrying the Light to Asia.
Historians believe these same sketches were used at the start of Bartholdi’s work for the statue in New York Harbor. The two are remarkably similar, though the “fellah,” or peasant woman, shown in the the early sketches is Middle Eastern and doesn’t wear a crown.
In truth, most historians think Bartholdi used his mother, Augusta Charlotte Bartholdi, as a model for the Statue of Liberty. In 1876, Bartholdi introduced a French senator to his mother, and the senator remarked that she looked like the statue. Bartholdi responded that she was the model, according to Barry Moreno, author of The Statue of Liberty Encyclopedia and a National Park Service librarian at the Statue of Liberty National Monument and Ellis Island.
Then, many years later, in the early 21st century, internet rumors began, insisting that Bartholdi’s model was Isabelle Boyer, a French woman married first to the inventor of the sewing machine, Isaac Singer, and then to a duke from Luxembourg. There has been no documentation of this, and she isn’t mentioned in the National Park Service’s information about the statue.
Another more likely inspiration is the Roman goddess Libertas, a female robed figure found on American coins and civic art beginning in 1793, according to Moreno, who wrote about her extensively in his book. Because of her status as a goddess, many Americans said the statue was disrespectful and not in line with the country’s Judeo-Christian basis. One 1880 article said the Statue of Liberty “proclaim(s) that mankind receives true light, not from Christ and Christianity, but from heathenism and her gods.”
Despite this early reaction, the sight of Lady Liberty continues to be a hopeful symbol of freedom for many people, not just Americans. This might explain why there are hundreds of Statues of Liberty of all sizes around the world, including an original model in Paris and a replica in the first Legoland, in Billund, Denmark, that’s made of 400,000 Lego bricks. There is one in Las Vegas and one in Tokyo Bay, but none of these works are as magnificent as the real thing, especially because of her impressive dimensions. From the base to the top of the torch, Liberty Enlightening the World is 305 feet, once the tallest metal statue ever constructed.
There are at least two other Statue of Liberty claims to fame. Gustave Eiffel, engineer of the Eiffel Tower, designed the interior armature of Lady Liberty, helping to prove that the Paris monument could be safely constructed. The statue had to support its own weight, handle the extreme weather of New York, and not create electrical charges because of its interaction with water. Eiffel’s team first built the statue in France, then dismantled it for its journey to New York.
Second, the statue is also beloved for the poem, “The New Colossus” by Emma Lazarus, etched into her base. For decades, it seemed to speak directly to each of the over 12 million immigrants future Americans who passed through the immigration tests and inspections at Ellis Island, right next to Liberty Island. Especially poignant are its most famous lines:
“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!”
Since 2010, Donna Raskin, a longtime writer and editor, has taught history classes at the College of New Jersey. As a child, she read and re-read every book in the Childhood of Famous Americans series. As an adult, she collects fashion history books and has traveled to Paris on a fashion history tour. In addition to contributing to Biography.com, she is the senior health and fitness editor at Bicycling and Runner’s World.
