Franklin Bachelder Simmons (January 11, 1839 Webster, Maine

Maine

Maine is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States, bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the east and south, New Hampshire to the west, and the Canadian provinces of Quebec to the northwest and New Brunswick to the northeast. Maine is both the northernmost and easternmost...

 – December 8, 1913 Rome

Rome

Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...

) was a prominent American sculptor of the nineteenth century.

Simmons spent most of his childhood in Bath, Maine

Bath, Maine

Bath is a city in Sagadahoc County, Maine, in the United States. As of the 2000 census, the city population was 9,266. It is the county seat of Sagadahoc County. Located on the Kennebec River, Bath is a port of entry with a good harbor. The city is popular with tourists, many drawn by its...

 and Lewiston, Maine

Lewiston, Maine

Lewiston is a city in Androscoggin County in Maine, and the second-largest city in the state. The population was 41,592 at the 2010 census. It is one of two principal cities of and included within the Lewiston-Auburn, Maine metropolitan New England city and town area and the Lewiston-Auburn, Maine...

. He attended Bates College

Bates College

Bates College is a highly selective, private liberal arts college located in Lewiston, Maine, in the United States. and was most recently ranked 21st in the nation in the 2011 US News Best Liberal Arts Colleges rankings. The college was founded in 1855 by abolitionists...

 (then called the Maine State Seminary) in 1858. Simmons started sculpting and painting during childhood. He studied with John Adams Jackson

John Adams Jackson

John Adams Jackson was a noted American sculptor.Jackson was born in Bath, Maine, and apprenticed to a machinist in Boston, where he gave evidence of talent by modelling a bust of Thomas Buchanan Read. There he studied linear and geometrical drawing and produced crayon portraits...

.

During the last two years of the American Civil War

American Civil War

The American Civil War was a civil war fought in the United States of America. In response to the election of Abraham Lincoln as President of the United States, 11 southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America ; the other 25...

, he moved to Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C.

Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....

 and sculpted members of Lincoln's Cabinet and military officers. The sculptures were cast in bronze and medallions were created. The Union League of Philadelphia purchased most of the medallions. In 1867 Simmons received an honorary A.M. from Bates College

Bates College

Bates College is a highly selective, private liberal arts college located in Lewiston, Maine, in the United States. and was most recently ranked 21st in the nation in the 2011 US News Best Liberal Arts Colleges rankings. The college was founded in 1855 by abolitionists...

 and from Colby

Colby

- People :As a surname:* Anita Colby , actress* Anthony Colby , Governor of New Hampshire* Bainbridge Colby * Barbara Colby , actress* C.B...

.

Simmons went to live in Rome in 1868, but returned several times.

Works

Among Simmons' more important works are the statues of Roger Williams

Roger Williams (theologian)

Roger Williams was an English Protestant theologian who was an early proponent of religious freedom and the separation of church and state. In 1636, he began the colony of Providence Plantation, which provided a refuge for religious minorities. Williams started the first Baptist church in America,...

, in the United States Capitol

United States Capitol

The United States Capitol is the meeting place of the United States Congress, the legislature of the federal government of the United States. Located in Washington, D.C., it sits atop Capitol Hill at the eastern end of the National Mall...

 in Washington and in Providence and Roger Williams Park

Roger Williams Park

Roger Williams Park, in the southern part of the city of Providence, Rhode Island, is an elaborately landscaped city park and is a historic district listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The park is named after the founder of the city of Providence and one of the founders of the...

; William King

William King (governor)

William King was an American merchant, shipbuilder, army officer, and statesman from Bath, Maine. A proponent of statehood for Maine, he became its first Governor when it separated from Massachusetts in 1820....

, for the state of Maine; Oliver P. Morton, in Indianapolis; Henry W. Longfellow (1887), in Portland; "Robert Treat Paine

Robert Treat Paine

Robert Treat Paine was a signer of the Declaration of Independence as a representative of Massachusetts.-Early life and ancestors:...

", and "Jochebed with the Infant Moses" in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts, is one of the largest museums in the United States, attracting over one million visitors a year. It contains over 450,000 works of art, making it one of the most comprehensive collections in the Americas...

; "Medusa" (1882); "Grief and History," the group that surmounts the naval monument at Washington ; "Galatea" (1884) ; "Penelope" in the De Young Museum, and Berkshire Museum; "The Promised Land" in the Metropolitan Museum of Art

Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art is a renowned art museum in New York City. Its permanent collection contains more than two million works, divided into nineteen curatorial departments. The main building, located on the eastern edge of Central Park along Manhattan's Museum Mile, is one of the...

; " Miriam "; "Washington at Valley Forge"; "Peace Monument"; and " The Seraph Abdiel," from "Paradise Lost " (1886).

Among his portrait busts are those of Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln

Abraham Lincoln was the 16th President of the United States, serving from March 1861 until his assassination in April 1865. He successfully led his country through a great constitutional, military and moral crisis – the American Civil War – preserving the Union, while ending slavery, and...

, William T. Sherman, David D. Porter, James G. Blaine

James G. Blaine

James Gillespie Blaine was a U.S. Representative, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, U.S. Senator from Maine, two-time Secretary of State...

, Francis Wayland

Francis Wayland

Francis Wayland , American Baptist educator and economist, was born in New York City, New York. He was president of Brown University and pastor of the First Baptist Church in America in Providence, Rhode Island. In Washington, D.C., Wayland Seminary was established in 1867, primarily to educate...

, and Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant

Ulysses S. Grant was the 18th President of the United States as well as military commander during the Civil War and post-war Reconstruction periods. Under Grant's command, the Union Army defeated the Confederate military and ended the Confederate States of America...

 (1886).

External links

• Art Cyclopedia List of Famous Works
• Universal Cyclopædia & Atlas, 1902 ed., New York, D. Appleton & Co.