memorial had also provided for a monument to George Washington, which
was created by the sculptor J. Massey Rhind, and for a third memorial to
the soldiers and sailors of all our wars, to the men who had given their
lives in making and maintaining the republic. Since Mr. Van Horn’s
death, World War I had been added to the list. Almost before the Lincoln
was finished, Ralph Lum asked Gutzon to begin thinking about the
military monument, but the sum of a hundred thousand dollars bequeathed
for the purpose was not immediately available and he had to wait. Of his
idea to portray mass action the sculptor wrote:
We do things in the mass, not as individuals. Mass action is the
keynote of our civilization. Why should it not inspire our
monuments? What opportunities there have been in our history for
the inspiration of great sculpture animated by that mass spirit.
What I should like to see, for instance, is a monument to Lincoln
that would include his cabinet. The more one grows, the more his
close associates grow with him. And there are the colonial
settlements, the founders of the republic and the Western pioneers
still waiting to be memorialized in mass action.
The sculptor began his first designs in more or less the conventional
way. He adopted the shaft or the upright column, which is often used as
a symbol of civilization, and surrounded that shaft with figures,
struggling, rising above material difficulties. In making this model he
discovered that it failed completely to express the natural impulses of
the human being under stress, either attacking or defending himself
against an enemy. All war monuments, he decided, should be planned to
depict emotions when threatened by loss of a way of life which was at
once familiar and sacred to every family, tribe or nation.
When that idea became clear the problem of a memorial to men who had
sacrificed their lives for home and country became one of human anxiety
and confusion out of which order, organization and direction gradually
developed. This went hand in hand with the thought that the wars of
America were defensive wars, that America was not a crusader in a
militant sense. The war with England, for example, was a declaration of
independence, in no way a struggle for dominion beyond America’s own
boundaries. And the First World War was, in the sculptor’s own words,
“probably the most remarkable example of utter disinterestedness in
conquest.” Monuments that are built for war, he concluded, generally
treat battle and fighting as part of the process of civilization, while
in fact civilization develops its lines of peace on confidence and in
ways that are antagonistic to war. Of how the plan slowly developed in
his mind he said:
My first sketch, following abandonment of the shaft idea,
represented a confused group of men who were attempting to organize
[Illustration:
_Photo by Lincoln Borglum_
“THE TRAIL DRIVERS”
This group is in Breckenridge Park, San Antonio, Texas.]
[Illustration: THE BORGLUMS’ DAUGHTER
Mary Ellis Borglum is now Mrs. David Vhay.]
themselves and move toward leadership, with Washington and Lincoln
symbolically present. But symbolism, though necessary in a group of
this kind, had great disadvantages in that it introduced an
unnecessary idea of unreality in the passing of great individuals,
which appeared to me to be hurtful in a work of art. It seemed that
Lincoln and Washington standing together as historic characters
introduced a thought that was hurtful to the life and reality of
the group. It might give a mystical character that would detract
from its vitality.
Finally in the last sketch I introduced two horses because the
horse is not only a companion to man but is his closest companion
in times of danger, as a carrier, a weapon, or a friend.
Artistically and sculpturally his excitement and nervous tension
can be used either realistically or symbolically in a group to add
life and strength and to suggest a fear that we would not want to
show in a human figure. I felt also that in a group of so many
figures an upward movement was preferable to keeping them flat on
the ground. When I elevated the center of the base of the monument
the change instantly increased the sense of struggle and effect.
The defensive character of American wars is suggested in the first
part of the work, consisting of a group of four figures. I have
drawn the figures of men who will resist anything they think
unjust. I have clothed these men in the uniforms of three wars,
over a century apart, and strangely enough there is no incongruity
of effect.
Although these figures represent mass resistance in the Colonial
and Civil War and World War periods, only one man in the group has
drawn a weapon. I have shown here four men who form the front and
bulwark of a group of forty-odd characters, representing an entire
nation mobilizing under pressure of war, and only one man among
them displays an implement that could injure another. I have chosen
the sword because it is symbolic of authority.
Immediately back of this group I have represented the only
organized mass action indicating battle. There are five or six
figures, infantry and marines, charging forward with their rifles,
six guns in the hands of as many men, and they represent the entire
armament of this national monument.
Just at this point, as an allegro of the symphony, I have
introduced the two horses to accent the power and movement of an
irresistible forward plunge, with plain indication of the loss of
control that always appears under great stress. In these horses I
have shown a different character to indicate their separate
response to the movement.
From this point backward the composition indicates organization,
preparedness, equipment and such confusion as extends behind the
battle line to the recruiting source and into the home, indicating,
I feel, that America’s battles are all for the _defense_ of her
homes.
Nine different models were made, and the development of the
composition covered considerably over two years of time. The entire
composition was modeled full size, as it appears in bronze, without
having been “pointed out” as is usually the custom. About forty
tons of clay were used. Every bit of it was handled four or five
times. The large group itself required about three years of
incessant labor.
The characters of the group are known people of our time. They are
portraits which it is not necessary to indicate. For example, the
aviator was a personal friend of mine, John Purroy Mitchell, former
mayor of New York, whom I included because of his patriotism and
because he, like so many other gallant airmen, was a sacrifice, I
have been told, not to battle but to criminal mismanagement behind
the battle line.
This group in bronze is the first accomplished part of a plan I
have had in mind for over thirty years--to develop monumental art
into a living, active, historical record of moods, lives and
characters of the men and women who are responsible for our
national development.
In the enlargement of the idea and the making of various models Ralph
Lum, whom the sculptor had come to know in the making of the Lincoln
memorial, played an important part. The mutual trust and regard
established between the lawyer and the sculptor was a dominating factor
in producing the memorial. Such a relationship between sponsor and
creator is unique in the annals of public memorials in America. A like
relationship is not a matter of record anywhere else unless, perhaps,
between Pericles and Phidias.
On February 11, 1921, ten years after the completion of the Newark
Lincoln memorial, Mr. Lum, acting for the three executors, awarded the
commission to Gutzon Borglum and authorized him to go to work. When
photographs of the model were published wagers were laid among artists
that it would be impossible for any sculptor to keep his creative
impulse fixed on one subject long enough to produce an art work of such
proportions. They did not know that monotony or dulled interest was an
impossibility to an artist who regarded variety not as the spice of life
but as its bread and butter. Always he had two or three productions on
hand as well as an enormous correspondence, a lecture to art students, a
promised magazine article and a political campaign in which a
“progressive” candidate must be elected lest the heavens fall.
He was doing the Sheridan memorial for Chicago, which nearly filled his
Stamford studio, when he received the Wars of America commission.
Characteristically, he immediately began to clear a place in the woods
near his home and to dig out the ground for a foundation. The foundation
he built of stones covered with cement, a support stout enough to be
unshaken by any number of tons of clay or marble. On this he built a
bigger studio with walls of stone, while at the same time he laid out
the armature for the big group in the middle. Under his personal
supervision large rocks for the base of the walls were dragged by horses
and tackle from the bed of the near-by river.
The location of so huge a monument demanded much thought and
preparation. Eventually the City of Newark cheerfully spent another
hundred thousand dollars for the setting of the group. Regarding this
matter the sculptor wrote to Carl Bannwort, of the Newark Parks
Department:
Now that the monument matter is settled, won’t you get hold of
Caparn, your landscape architect, and let us have a conference
about where it will be placed? If you and he will come over and
lunch with me, we can talk this park proposition over in detail.
You have a chance to have the best memorial in the United States
and I don’t want any slip through my failing to be beforehand. You
are always in such a hurry yourself, anyway, you will be rebuking
me if I don’t keep one or two steps ahead of you.
A little later Mr. Bannwort replied:
This is a subject I hardly dare mention. The mere whisper of it may
cause as great a stir in the large area of your cerebellum as when
a brick is tossed into the pond and visibly agitates every molecule
of water.
When we move the bandstand and other excrescences from Military
Park, the memorial site, to make room for the monument, we must
have a tool shed. Is there no way of putting a door at the northern
end of your plinth and using some of the space under the bronze
group for this utilitarian purpose? For fear that a whole load of
bricks will be heaved by you with deadly aim, I say no more at
present.
The modeling was “going splendidly,” as the sculptor wrote, when Mr. Lum
brought up a subject of prime importance, which of itself involved a
whole volume of correspondence. This was the casting in bronze of the
huge memorial. Mr. Lum wrote:
I am wondering if you could within the next week secure some
estimate for the casting from some reliable concern. I have no
thought of your giving the contract to anyone at present, for I
think the prices are apt to decline further; but I would like to
get some definite estimate. The way many sculptors and other people
are constantly putting it up to me--that the casting can never be
completed and the work delivered for anything like your contract
price--would unsettle my nerves were I not so sure of you and your
ability to put through anything you undertake. But I would feel
relieved to see some cost estimates just the same.
In answer to Mr. Lum, whose chief concern now was that the sculptor was
putting so much into the memorial that he could expect no profit for
himself, Gutzon sent a list of bronzes he had produced, with a careful
comparison of size, weight and cost. His conclusion was that the
forty-two figures of the Wars of America were equal to about sixteen
single figures and that the contract price of $100,000 would “see him
through.” As a matter of safety, he added, he was corresponding with
European bronze casters who might do the work for much less than would
be charged in this country.
He was dismayed when the American estimates came in--from the Gorham
Company, $123,000; from Roman Bronze, $87,000; from Henry Bonnard,
$78,857. This meant that every bit of the available money would be spent
for the bronze casting alone, which is usually less than half the cost
of a monument. It was an immense relief when from the Vignali Brothers
of Florence, Italy, came an estimate of 475,000 lire, which at that
time, October 1921, was worth about $20,000. A contract was signed to
the effect that the monument would be shipped from New York in eight
sections (plaster casts) and that the first bronze section was to be
returned not later than February 1, 1922, and the other seven sections
before the end of the same year.
And then the misfortune that had dogged the sculptor if ever he went
into a business deal was again at his heels. He had an Italian friend in
the United States who said he was going abroad and for the honor of
being a part of so noble a work would gladly make all the business
arrangements with the Vignali firm. Into the contract the friend
inserted two wholly unexpected clauses--that the sculptor was to be
penalized for every day’s delay in getting the plaster casts to
Florence, and that the friend was to receive a ten-per-cent commission
on such a penalty as well as on the contract with the sculptor himself.
It was later learned that the friend sued Vignali for refusing to
inflict the penalty on the sculptor. Vignali, being familiar with the
optimism of art, had never expected Gutzon to deliver the models on
time.
There was a weary imbroglio. The sculptor sent his assistant, Hugo
Villa, to superintend the whole bronze-casting business. Hugo reported
in 1925 that the first group of figures which had been shipped in 1922
were only partly cast; that later groups to arrive had been cast and
were scattered all over the foundry; that the contract made by the
sculptor’s friend was a pretty bad one.
In Newark, meanwhile, all the burden of explanation fell upon Ralph Lum,
a man of exemplary patience, who was being constantly asked by artists,
reporters and expectant citizens what had become of the memorial. In
answer to one of his many letters Gutzon wrote in 1922:
The new studio I had to improvise for this memorial has been a
great physical burden, while the sheer labor of creating such a
group has been terrible. However, that is all overcome now, and I
have simply to take up figure by figure and group by group, with
some concentrated work of course, but it will be like revamping a
manuscript you have written.
Now about finishing the group of horses by the first of this month,
as you hope. This is quite possible in point of time and labor, but
it would be bad and harmful. You will be surprised to hear me say
I’m a little sorry the main figures are gone to be cast so I cannot
work more on them. I do not need to tell you I shall do nothing
that will hurt the final result, but I ought to say that I work so
rapidly no allowance is made for my slowing up. This work is a
colossal undertaking. A true, clear perspective of it as a whole
must be maintained throughout its making. Handling a mountain of
material is of itself a man’s job continuously. For that I
calculated, but the housing and the danger of freezing and the
responsibility of caring for so much I did not consider as I now
would.
If a sculptor should undertake to do one figure a month,
complete--twelve figures a year--it would be undertaking the
unheard of in art. Yet as the work stands today, I’ve done much
more than that. In the next sixty days I shall have done nineteen
human figures and two horses. I have spent at least half my working
time, by necessity, to properly house and protect the work. These
nineteen or twenty figures are all separate and amount to about two
thirds of the whole. I don’t believe anything like it was ever done
before. I certainly could not repeat it and should not want to. As
to its value, you know better than anyone else that the group is
worth half a million if it is worth a cent.
In a previous letter the sculptor had written in a different mood: “The
work is going splendidly, but I am terribly tired--more constantly tired
than at any time in my life--and it’s not because I have reached the age
of one hundred.” Answering both letters, Mr. Lum wrote:
I can realize, as you know, better than anyone else all that you
say, except the single fact of your having grown so terrifically
fatigued by the labor of our great work. I can’t think of you as
tired. Somehow I don’t associate it with you. Can’t you just go
away from it all for a week or two and then get the labor of the
rear group out of the way and get it shipped and boxed? I am
leaving for abroad next week, and of course I realize now that we
can’t possibly unveil this fall. But I know I will have to move out
of town if everything isn’t in readiness by early spring. That you
should have a million dollars and ten years’ time for this work I
know full well.
Gutzon was still at his wit’s end. The first group of four figures had
not been shipped until September 1922, and by contract all the forty-two
figures in eight groups were to be returned before the end of December.
There had been delays in getting clay into wax, delays which eventually
made the unveiling four years late. For these delays the dimensions of
the group and the sculptor’s determination that only his best work
should be fixed in bronze were responsible.
The Stone Mountain project, started in 1915 before the Wars of America
project had been authorized, had now been suddenly revived and the
sponsors were demanding Gutzon’s return to Atlanta. Still the sculptor’s
work was virtually done when again, as the Italians say, “The devil put
his tail in the business.” The total expense of shipping the crates of
plaster casts to Florence had been about $2,000, as done by an American
shipper, Caldwell and Company. Now came a bill for twice that amount
for returning bronzes which occupied less space. The shipment was
handled by an Italian who added extra fees for trucking from Florence to
Leghorn and “deck charges.” Finally there was a peremptory demand from
Gutzon’s friend for $2,000 as his commission.
In paying other bills that he thought to be legitimate the sculptor had
already used all available funds while he himself worked for nothing
because, as he wrote to Mr. Lum in 1926, “This monument must be put up
if I have to keep on paying for it to the end of my life and mortgage
all I possess.” Confronted now by demands that he thought unjust but
could not carry to court, he borrowed money to pay them and gave several
of his small marbles as security.
Troubles never come singly, says an old proverb. Gutzon was at Stone
Mountain, absorbed in another work, when word came that all the bronze
casts had at last arrived in Newark, where no one had the slightest idea
of what to do with them. By keeping the wires hot the sculptor located
his old friend Bob Baillie, who dropped his own work and hurried to
Newark. There presently he was joined by Villa. At the hands of these
two, and by what the sculptor gratefully accepted as an act of
Providence, the great work moved swiftly to its climax. Several years
later Mr. Vignali asked the sculptor if he had found a case of champagne
in the neck of one of the horses. Gutzon said he hoped that the welders
made a party with it.
The unveiling at Military Park on Memorial Day, 1927, was thrilling
enough to efface all memory of the years of waiting. The mayor of
Newark, Thomas L. Raymond, had formally proclaimed a public festival; he
eulogized, among other things, “the excessive generosity and spirit of
self-sacrifice of the sculptor Gutzon Borglum, who has given without
limit of his genius, his time and effort.” Because the memorial was
national, not local, invitations had been sent to the President of the
United States and his Cabinet, to all governors, to senators,
congressmen and persons of distinction in national life, scores of whom
responded and were present in festival spirit with tens of thousands of
New Jersey citizens.
The orator of the day was Secretary of the Navy Wilbur. Over the
inspiring scene floated silvery captive balloons. At a bugle signal they
rose, lifting the flags which had been concealed in the monument, and
out flew forty-eight pairs of carrier pigeons to speed the message of
good will to every state in the union. The sculptor’s contribution had
been to scatter poppies over the green around the memorial as an
expression of his own feeling for the soldiers and sailors who had given
their lives for the United States. When it was his turn to speak he
said:
It would be impossible for me to express the pleasure I feel and
the gratitude to God that I am able today to deliver to you and
through you to Newark and to America this memorial monument to the
people who have founded and protected a new freedom of the world.
The design in its dramatic sense is conceived as a moment of crisis
when the life of the state is threatened and depicts America’s
manner of meeting such a crisis. It is a memorial to soldiers and
sailors. It is a monument to the fortitude of the American people.
It is located here because here Washington stood. Here he many
times assembled his troops. Here Lafayette was received by your
forefathers, and the building of this monument was prophesied. Here
Jackson met your citizens, as did Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt and
the other great leaders. All these staunch souls foregathered here
on the very ground whereon this design is set, to discuss their
course or part or, if necessary, pay sacrifice to national service.
The design itself represents a great spearhead, consistent with the
character of Military Park. Upon the field of this spearhead we
have placed a great Tudor sword, its blade the pool, its hilt the
monument representing the American nation at a crisis, answering
the call to arms.
As news of the unveiling spread through the country, with descriptions
of the impressive ceremony in the newspapers, a flood of congratulatory
letters came in, some from old friends, some from strangers, many from
distinguished sources. All criticism of the sculptor who had undertaken
two big jobs at once was now forgotten. He was assured that such a work
of art was well worth waiting for. One of the letters was from Robert
Baillie, most valued by the sculptor because of its human quality and
because the writer had worked in the studio and understood him and what
he had been trying to do. Baillie wrote:
Mrs. Baillie and myself want to say how much we thought of the
group and the unveiling ceremony. It was simply glorious in spite
of the rain. I liked what you said, and Mr. Lum’s acceptance was
well worded; but what appealed to me most was the message from the
governor of Georgia. I think that was the most sincere tribute to
your efforts that I have heard at any time, and well it may be so
since they now know what they have lost. You certainly have made a
warm spot in the hearts of Newark’s citizens and one that will not
be forgotten by them. I am sure that you have had many letters of
congratulations but none, I can assure you, more sincere than ours.
And Ralph Lum added: “You know how much the association with you has
meant to me, and my joy that it has all worked out so beautifully is an
abiding and comfortable one.”
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
_STONE MOUNTAIN_
You probably have heard the story of Stone Mountain, Georgia, as who,
alive, hasn’t. Stone Mountain is an isolated mass of granite that rises
abruptly from a plain near Atlanta, and on its precipitous face Gutzon
Borglum once started to carve the pageant of the Confederate Army. The
idea had its inception somewhere around 1910 or 1911. Borglum was asked
to look at the project in 1915; began his preliminary work on it shortly
before the First World War; carving was started in June 1923; the head
of Robert E. Lee, a gigantic sculpture, was unveiled in January 1924;
the figures of Stonewall Jackson and Jefferson Davis were roughed out
during the summer of 1924; on February 18, 1925, there were words
between the sculptor and a representative of the Stone Mountain
Confederate Memorial Association; by midsummer the models were broken,
Borglum had left Georgia, and what was probably the world’s first
attempt at mountain carving was abandoned.
The years have produced a variety of stories about what happened at
Stone Mountain, most of them untrue, and there is little use now in
summing them up. But the wreckage on the mountain was an evident fact,
as was the finish of one of sculpture’s most astounding efforts. From
what remained of the carving it was easy to envision the Confederacy’s
last glorious march--the ride of the great leaders with horse, foot and
artillery across the vast granite wall toward what had looked like
immortality. But there wasn’t going to be any immortality.