Pioneer Woman
Encyclopedia
The Pioneer Woman monument is a bronze sculpture in Ponca City
, Oklahoma
, designed by Bryant Baker
and dedicated on April 22, 1930. The statue is of a sunbonneted woman leading a child by the hand. It was donated to the State of Oklahoma by millionaire oilman E. W. Marland
. He commissioned models from twelve well-known sculptors and financed a nationwide tour to get feedback from art critics and the general public in order to decide which model to use for the final statue.
involving numerous statues based on the theme of the settling of the American West and attempted to persuade Davidson to take it on. When Davidson declined Marland replies that he could pay for it, prompting Davidson to come back with "I don't doubt it for a minute, but I don't see myself working for you for the rest of my life." Marland ultimately convinced Davidson to go to Ponca City, Marland's then home town, and create three statues for him: one of Marland and one of each of Marland's adopted children, Lydie
and George.
While Davidson was producing his three Marland statues E.W. told him of another project that he has in mind, "E.W.'s most cherished dream." Davidson writes, " It was to be a twenty-five foot figure, which he planned to put up on a hill where it could be seen for miles ... E.W. brought his friends to see what I was doing. He acted as if he was the sculptor, and in conversation would say that he was doing the figure - that I was his hands."
Marland's inspiration for this project included his pioneering mother and grandmother.
, George Grey Barnard
and Paul Manship
turned Marland down, also declining were the only two women invited, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney
and Anna Hyatt Huntington
, leaving him with an even dozen artists, all males. The artists who submitted models were Bryant Baker
, A, Stirling Calder
, Jo Davidson
, James Earle Fraser, John Gregory
, F. Lynn Jenkins, Mario Korbel
, Arthur Lee
, Hermon Atkins MacNeil
, Maurice Sterne
, Mahonri Young
, and Wheeler Williams
. The models were to tour America and everyone who visited the sites where they were exhibited was allowed to vote for their favorite.
Marland's original idea was to have a woman in pioneer dress accompanied by a child, and so he provided a sunbonnet to each sculptor. While the artists were not limited to these ideas, nine of the twelve models included a sunbonnet and all save for Jo Davidson's included a child. Both Davidson and Calder visited Oklahoma to gain further inspiration.
Mahonri Young's biographer Thomas Toone relates that Young produced not only the required three foot tall statuette, but also a plaster version of the entire Pioneer Memorial as he envisioned it, replete with detailed bas-reliefs of western scenes around the base of a massive pedestal and platform, on top of which the pioneer woman "holds her child in the embrace of a Renaissance Madonna." A pair of spirited bison guard the stairs leading up the base. The voting public was not privy to Young's vision and his work showed poorly in the balloting. Young, who described not winning the competition as the worst disappointment in his career, did manage to get some of his ideas out in later works.
Toone also adds that the winning sculptor, Baker Bryant used, "a professional actress as his model, which produced a glamourous figure, representing Western myth more than reality."
There are some questions raised about the winning design by Donald De Lue
, at that time Baker Bryant's assistant. De Lue's biographer, D. Roger Howlett makes several points about the Pioneer Woman statue.
"it was especially on the "Pioneer Woman" that De Lue manifest his talent. . . .... Baker claimed that the conception and movement of the final monument was developed in an eight-to-ten inch sketch model made by him a few hours after he learned about the competition. De Lue executed the thirty-three inch competition model for the sculpture in 1927, with Baker supervising and completing the face." Baker was also the last sculptor to enter the contest having only one month to prepare his model.
James Earle Fraser based his almost Impressionistic statue on his favorite aunt, Dora, who was herself a pioneer woman. This model is unique among the ones submitted to the competition, and perhaps in the entire world of Pioneer Women Statues, in that the woman, caught breast feeding her child, exposes a bare breast. No stranger to multi-tasking, she still manages to hold on to her rifle while feeding the baby.
Many years after the competition Wheeler Williams' model was re-discovered, enlarged, cast, and now sits in front of the public library in Liberty, Kansas
.
Marland reserved the right to make the final choice for the monument, but he sought input from the public and so these models then began a tour of museums and art galleries across the nation. From its opening at the Reinhardt Galleries, the tour moved on. Stops included Boston, Pittsburgh
, Cincinnati
, Buffalo
, Detroit
, Indianapolis
, Chicago, Minneapolis
, Kansas City
, Dallas
, Oklahoma City
, Fort Worth
, and Ponca City
. At each location visitors were invited to vote for their three favorite models. In all over 750,000 people viewed the models and over 120,000 votes were placed.
The models were the subject of much discussion at the time, and photographs of them were included in full-page pictorials of both the New York Times and the LA Times. Art critics discussed the merits of one model over another and almost universally lambasting the sunbonnets as "terrible headwear". The models were even the subject of writing assignments for elementary school art classes.
The L.A. Times reported that art critic Helen Appleton Read felt that "no adequate tribute had been paid to the pioneer woman" and that "most of the competitors failed to produce anything monumental".
On December 20, 1927, E. W. Marland's son George announced that Bryant Baker's model was selected as the winner. Baker's model received the most votes in 11 cities and Gregory's was the second most popular, being the favorite in three cities.
When the tour of the models was over, Baker's Pioneer Woman had won first place, out-balloting John Gregory's effort 42,478 to 37,782. "De Lue set to work in 1928 and 1929, modeling it in Baker's Brooklyn studio, working with Jean La Seure, the enlarger. De Lue later remembered: "One day Bryant decided he would work on it, and did some work. I said, 'Look, Bryant, if I were you I'd get the hell out of here, because you're not helping at all,' He said, 'Thank you very much.' and he went."
Marland had purchased 2,000 acres on which to place the statue. The area where the statue was erected stands just off of U.S. Route 77, a mile northeast of the center of Ponca City.
Baker said the work took years off of his life and he was afraid he would die before completion.
which opened the Oklahoma Territory to settlers. The day was declared a state holiday by the governor and the celebration in Ponca City included a parade, 19-gun salute. An estimated 40,000 people attended the unveiling.
The dedication itself began at 1:30 pm central time with a nationwide radio address on WJZ
by United States President Herbert Hoover
broadcasting from the White House. He introduced the native Oklahoman, Secretary of War Patrick J. Hurley
who had intended to attend the unveiling in person before his visit was curtailed by illness and so spoke from his home. After the first half-hour the broadcast continued from Ponca City. Other speakers during the 90 minute broadcast were Marland, Baker, Episcopal Bishop of Oklahoma Thomas Casady
, Oklahoma Governor William J. Holloway, and Oklahoma humorist, Will Rogers
, who closed the unveiling ceremonies.
of the Cherokee Outlet
which included the land of Ponca City, the state opened the Pioneer Woman Museum, on land adjacent to the monument. An image of the Pioneer Woman statue serves as the de facto logo of the museum.
".
The statue faces to the southwest, symbolising that the majority of the settlers had come from the northeast.
There is a plaque on the first step beneath the statue which reads:
In 1941 as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations the General Federation of Women's Clubs
presented gold and bronze medals with a bas-relief of the Pioneer Woman to prominent and long-standing members.
The statue is also the official emblem of the four-state Ozark Frontier Trail.
When the State Quarter for Oklahoma was to be issued in 2008, there was a statewide call for proposals to be sent to the Mint for final design work. From the thousands of designs received, five were sent along to the mint. Four of the five submitted designs included the Pioneer Woman. When the professional designs returned from the mint in order for the people of Oklahoma to decide on the final design by voting amongst them, none of the designs included the book which is held under the Pioneer Woman's arm. As this book is often thought to be a Bible
, this was viewed as an attempt at censorship by the government and caused a statewide controversy. Eventually the fifth design was selected.
That the book was intended to be the Bible was made clear by Baker in an interview in which he stated, "In trying to symbolize the Pioneer Woman of America I wanted to depict Courage and Faith... The Bible was a vital factor in building up this country, and it often was the one indispensable book, recording the facts of the family life, of births, marriages and death and often the only reading material available for mothers to teach their children to read and write in those days."
In 1959 a 36' tall fiberglass sculpture by Gordon Shumaker was produced to commemorate the first 100 years of the Minnesota State Fair
. It stands in front of the Pioneer Building. Like the Ponca City statue it depicts a bonneted woman in ankle length dress striding forward, and like its predecessor she holds a large book/Bible in her right crooked arm as well as carrying a large bundle on the same arm. At 36 feet tall she more approaches the monumentality that Marland was originally seeking for his work.
Hardship and Dreams was the title of a sculpture by Dorothy Koelling (1913-2004) unveiled in Wichita, Kansas
on June 28, 1994. A newspaper article at that time described the work as being, "inspired by the monumental 'Pioneer Woman' in in Ponca City, Okla." Koeling's 6 foot tall statue depicts the bonneted pioneer woman, carrying a large book/Bible and bundle in her right arm, marching forward with her flatfooted son , whose hand she holds, next to her.
Ponca City, Oklahoma
Ponca City is a small city in Kay and Osage counties in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, which was named after the Ponca Tribe. Located in north central Oklahoma, it lies approximately south of the Kansas border, and approximately east of Interstate 35. 25,919 people called Ponca City home at the...
, Oklahoma
Oklahoma
Oklahoma is a state located in the South Central region of the United States of America. With an estimated 3,751,351 residents as of the 2010 census and a land area of 68,667 square miles , Oklahoma is the 28th most populous and 20th-largest state...
, designed by Bryant Baker
Bryant Baker
Percy Bryant Baker was a British-born American sculptor.-Life and career:Baker was born on 8 July 1881 in London, England, the son and grandson of sculptors and stone carvers and the brother of sculptor Robert Baker...
and dedicated on April 22, 1930. The statue is of a sunbonneted woman leading a child by the hand. It was donated to the State of Oklahoma by millionaire oilman E. W. Marland
E. W. Marland
Ernest Whitworth Marland was an American lawyer, oil businessman, and politician who served as the tenth Governor of Oklahoma.-Career as an Oilman:...
. He commissioned models from twelve well-known sculptors and financed a nationwide tour to get feedback from art critics and the general public in order to decide which model to use for the final statue.
Design and construction
Around 1925 Marland sketched out an ambitious sculptural program to sculptor Jo DavidsonJo Davidson
Jo Davidson was an American sculptor of Russian-Jewish descent. Although he specialized in realistic, intense portrait busts, Davidson did not require his subjects to formally pose for him; rather, he observed and spoke with them...
involving numerous statues based on the theme of the settling of the American West and attempted to persuade Davidson to take it on. When Davidson declined Marland replies that he could pay for it, prompting Davidson to come back with "I don't doubt it for a minute, but I don't see myself working for you for the rest of my life." Marland ultimately convinced Davidson to go to Ponca City, Marland's then home town, and create three statues for him: one of Marland and one of each of Marland's adopted children, Lydie
Lydie Marland
Lydie Marland , American socialite, was born Lyde Miller Roberts in Flourtown, Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, the second child to George Frederick Roberts and Margaret Reynolds Roberts and granddaughter of George W. Roberts and Mary B. Roberts and Samuel Cavin Collins, Sr. and Lydie "Eliza" ...
and George.
While Davidson was producing his three Marland statues E.W. told him of another project that he has in mind, "E.W.'s most cherished dream." Davidson writes, " It was to be a twenty-five foot figure, which he planned to put up on a hill where it could be seen for miles ... E.W. brought his friends to see what I was doing. He acted as if he was the sculptor, and in conversation would say that he was doing the figure - that I was his hands."
Marland's inspiration for this project included his pioneering mother and grandmother.
The models
At that point Marland sent out invitations to many of America's leading sculptors, offering them each a $10,000 honorarium to produce a roughly 3 foot (0.9144 m) tall bronze model for the statue. He further proposed that the models tour the United States and that the American public vote as to which of the models would be erected in Ponca City. Several sculptors, Daniel Chester FrenchDaniel Chester French
Daniel Chester French was an American sculptor. His best-known work is the sculpture of a seated Abraham Lincoln at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C.-Life and career:...
, George Grey Barnard
George Grey Barnard
'George Grey Barnard was an American sculptor, "an excellent American sculptor", the French art dealer René Gimpel reported in his diary , "very much engrossed in carving himself a fortune out of the trade in works of art." His lasting monument, rather than any sculpture of his own, is the...
and Paul Manship
Paul Manship
Paul Howard Manship was an American sculptor.-Life:Manship began his art studies at the St. Paul School of Art in Minnesota. From there he moved to Philadelphia and continued his education at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts...
turned Marland down, also declining were the only two women invited, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney
Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney was an American sculptor, art patron and collector, and founder in 1931 of the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City...
and Anna Hyatt Huntington
Anna Hyatt Huntington
Anna Vaughn Hyatt Huntington was an American sculptor.-Life and career:Huntington was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Her father, Alpheus Hyatt, was a professor of paleontology and zoology at Harvard University and MIT, and served as a contributing factor to her early interest in animals and...
, leaving him with an even dozen artists, all males. The artists who submitted models were Bryant Baker
Bryant Baker
Percy Bryant Baker was a British-born American sculptor.-Life and career:Baker was born on 8 July 1881 in London, England, the son and grandson of sculptors and stone carvers and the brother of sculptor Robert Baker...
, A, Stirling Calder
Alexander Stirling Calder
Alexander Stirling Calder was an American sculptor and teacher; son of the sculptor Alexander Milne Calder, and father of the sculptor Alexander Calder...
, Jo Davidson
Jo Davidson
Jo Davidson was an American sculptor of Russian-Jewish descent. Although he specialized in realistic, intense portrait busts, Davidson did not require his subjects to formally pose for him; rather, he observed and spoke with them...
, James Earle Fraser, John Gregory
John Gregory (sculptor)
-Life:When he was about 12 years old his family immigrated to the United States where he began is sculptural studies at the Art Students League in New York City. He continued these at both the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris and at the American Academy in Rome. At various times he studied with J...
, F. Lynn Jenkins, Mario Korbel
Mario Korbel
Mario Joseph Korbel, American sculptor born in Osik, Bohemia on March 22, 1882 to a clergyman, Joseph Korbel and his wife Katherina Dolezal Korbel. He began studying sculpture in his homeland, continuing his studies after moving to the United States at age 18...
, Arthur Lee
Arthur Lee (sculptor)
Arthur Lee was an American sculptor, born in Trondheim, Norway. His family immigrated to the United States in 1888, settling in St. Paul, Minnesota...
, Hermon Atkins MacNeil
Hermon Atkins MacNeil
Hermon Atkins MacNeil was an American sculptor born in Chelsea, Massachusetts.He was an instructor in industrial art at Cornell University from 1886 to 1889, and was then a pupil of Henri M. Chapu and Alexandre Falguière in Paris...
, Maurice Sterne
Maurice Sterne
Maurice Sterne was an American sculptor and painter remembered today for his association with philanthropist Mabel Dodge Luhan, to whom he was married from 1916 to 1923. He began his career as a draftsman and painter, and critics noted the similarity of his work, in its volume and weight, to...
, Mahonri Young
Mahonri Young
Mahonri Macintosh Young was an American sculptor and artist. Although he lived most of his life in New York City, Young is most remembered in Utah as being the grandson of Brigham Young, and who sculpted the This Is The Place Monument and the Seagull Monument in Salt Lake City...
, and Wheeler Williams
Wheeler Williams
Wheeler Williams was an American sculptor, born in Chicago, Illinois.-Life and career:Williams studied sculpture at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. He attended Yale where he graduated Magna cum Laude in 1919. He received a Master of Architecture degree from Harvard in 1922...
. The models were to tour America and everyone who visited the sites where they were exhibited was allowed to vote for their favorite.
Marland's original idea was to have a woman in pioneer dress accompanied by a child, and so he provided a sunbonnet to each sculptor. While the artists were not limited to these ideas, nine of the twelve models included a sunbonnet and all save for Jo Davidson's included a child. Both Davidson and Calder visited Oklahoma to gain further inspiration.
Mahonri Young's biographer Thomas Toone relates that Young produced not only the required three foot tall statuette, but also a plaster version of the entire Pioneer Memorial as he envisioned it, replete with detailed bas-reliefs of western scenes around the base of a massive pedestal and platform, on top of which the pioneer woman "holds her child in the embrace of a Renaissance Madonna." A pair of spirited bison guard the stairs leading up the base. The voting public was not privy to Young's vision and his work showed poorly in the balloting. Young, who described not winning the competition as the worst disappointment in his career, did manage to get some of his ideas out in later works.
Toone also adds that the winning sculptor, Baker Bryant used, "a professional actress as his model, which produced a glamourous figure, representing Western myth more than reality."
There are some questions raised about the winning design by Donald De Lue
Donald De Lue
Donald Harcourt De Lue was an American sculptor known for several prominent public monuments.-Biography:...
, at that time Baker Bryant's assistant. De Lue's biographer, D. Roger Howlett makes several points about the Pioneer Woman statue.
"it was especially on the "Pioneer Woman" that De Lue manifest his talent. . . .... Baker claimed that the conception and movement of the final monument was developed in an eight-to-ten inch sketch model made by him a few hours after he learned about the competition. De Lue executed the thirty-three inch competition model for the sculpture in 1927, with Baker supervising and completing the face." Baker was also the last sculptor to enter the contest having only one month to prepare his model.
James Earle Fraser based his almost Impressionistic statue on his favorite aunt, Dora, who was herself a pioneer woman. This model is unique among the ones submitted to the competition, and perhaps in the entire world of Pioneer Women Statues, in that the woman, caught breast feeding her child, exposes a bare breast. No stranger to multi-tasking, she still manages to hold on to her rifle while feeding the baby.
Many years after the competition Wheeler Williams' model was re-discovered, enlarged, cast, and now sits in front of the public library in Liberty, Kansas
Liberty, Kansas
Liberty is a city in Montgomery County, Kansas, United States. The population was 95 at the 2000 census.-Geography:Liberty is located at .According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all of it land....
.
The tour
The submitted bronze models were unveiled at the Reinhardt Galleries in New York on February 26, 1927 where they remained in exhibition until March 19. At a dinner for the twelve finalists the evening before the models were revealed to the public, Marland announced:Marland reserved the right to make the final choice for the monument, but he sought input from the public and so these models then began a tour of museums and art galleries across the nation. From its opening at the Reinhardt Galleries, the tour moved on. Stops included Boston, Pittsburgh
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Pittsburgh is the second-largest city in the US Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the county seat of Allegheny County. Regionally, it anchors the largest urban area of Appalachia and the Ohio River Valley, and nationally, it is the 22nd-largest urban area in the United States...
, Cincinnati
Cincinnati, Ohio
Cincinnati is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio. Cincinnati is the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located to north of the Ohio River at the Ohio-Kentucky border, near Indiana. The population within city limits is 296,943 according to the 2010 census, making it Ohio's...
, Buffalo
Buffalo, New York
Buffalo is the second most populous city in the state of New York, after New York City. Located in Western New York on the eastern shores of Lake Erie and at the head of the Niagara River across from Fort Erie, Ontario, Buffalo is the seat of Erie County and the principal city of the...
, Detroit
Detroit, Michigan
Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...
, Indianapolis
Indianapolis, Indiana
Indianapolis is the capital of the U.S. state of Indiana, and the county seat of Marion County, Indiana. As of the 2010 United States Census, the city's population is 839,489. It is by far Indiana's largest city and, as of the 2010 U.S...
, Chicago, Minneapolis
Minneapolis, Minnesota
Minneapolis , nicknamed "City of Lakes" and the "Mill City," is the county seat of Hennepin County, the largest city in the U.S. state of Minnesota, and the 48th largest in the United States...
, Kansas City
Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...
, Dallas
Dallas, Texas
Dallas is the third-largest city in Texas and the ninth-largest in the United States. The Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex is the largest metropolitan area in the South and fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States...
, Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
, Fort Worth
Fort Worth, Texas
Fort Worth is the 16th-largest city in the United States of America and the fifth-largest city in the state of Texas. Located in North Central Texas, just southeast of the Texas Panhandle, the city is a cultural gateway into the American West and covers nearly in Tarrant, Parker, Denton, and...
, and Ponca City
Ponca City, Oklahoma
Ponca City is a small city in Kay and Osage counties in the U.S. state of Oklahoma, which was named after the Ponca Tribe. Located in north central Oklahoma, it lies approximately south of the Kansas border, and approximately east of Interstate 35. 25,919 people called Ponca City home at the...
. At each location visitors were invited to vote for their three favorite models. In all over 750,000 people viewed the models and over 120,000 votes were placed.
The models were the subject of much discussion at the time, and photographs of them were included in full-page pictorials of both the New York Times and the LA Times. Art critics discussed the merits of one model over another and almost universally lambasting the sunbonnets as "terrible headwear". The models were even the subject of writing assignments for elementary school art classes.
The L.A. Times reported that art critic Helen Appleton Read felt that "no adequate tribute had been paid to the pioneer woman" and that "most of the competitors failed to produce anything monumental".
On December 20, 1927, E. W. Marland's son George announced that Bryant Baker's model was selected as the winner. Baker's model received the most votes in 11 cities and Gregory's was the second most popular, being the favorite in three cities.
When the tour of the models was over, Baker's Pioneer Woman had won first place, out-balloting John Gregory's effort 42,478 to 37,782. "De Lue set to work in 1928 and 1929, modeling it in Baker's Brooklyn studio, working with Jean La Seure, the enlarger. De Lue later remembered: "One day Bryant decided he would work on it, and did some work. I said, 'Look, Bryant, if I were you I'd get the hell out of here, because you're not helping at all,' He said, 'Thank you very much.' and he went."
Fundraising and construction
The cost of the Pioneer Woman project was approximately $350,000. This included a $10,000 honorarium for each of the twelve finalists plus $100,000 for the winner Bryant Baker. The remainder of the costs were accrued during the tour around the country and arranging the base for the statue. While the vast majority of the project was funded by Marland, his fortunes were on the decline at this time and so he was forced to seek additional funding to complete the project. Some private fundraising helped to defray the final costs and $25,000 was supplied by Lew Wentz, Marland's long-time business rival as well as fellow philanthropist of Ponca City.Marland had purchased 2,000 acres on which to place the statue. The area where the statue was erected stands just off of U.S. Route 77, a mile northeast of the center of Ponca City.
Baker said the work took years off of his life and he was afraid he would die before completion.
Dedication
On April 16, 1930 it was announced that the statue would be unveiled on April 22, 1930 on the 41st anniversary of the Land Run of 1889Land Run of 1889
The Oklahoma Land Rush of 1889 was the first land run into the Unassigned Lands and included all or part of the 2005 modern day Canadian, Cleveland, Kingfisher, Logan, Oklahoma, and Payne counties of the U.S. state of Oklahoma...
which opened the Oklahoma Territory to settlers. The day was declared a state holiday by the governor and the celebration in Ponca City included a parade, 19-gun salute. An estimated 40,000 people attended the unveiling.
The dedication itself began at 1:30 pm central time with a nationwide radio address on WJZ
WJZ
WJZ may currently refer to:*WJZ , a radio station licensed to Baltimore, Maryland, United States*WJZ-TV, a television station licensed to Baltimore, Maryland, United States...
by United States President Herbert Hoover
Herbert Hoover
Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31st President of the United States . Hoover was originally a professional mining engineer and author. As the United States Secretary of Commerce in the 1920s under Presidents Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge, he promoted partnerships between government and business...
broadcasting from the White House. He introduced the native Oklahoman, Secretary of War Patrick J. Hurley
Patrick J. Hurley
Patrick Jay Hurley was an American soldier, statesman, and diplomat....
who had intended to attend the unveiling in person before his visit was curtailed by illness and so spoke from his home. After the first half-hour the broadcast continued from Ponca City. Other speakers during the 90 minute broadcast were Marland, Baker, Episcopal Bishop of Oklahoma Thomas Casady
Thomas Casady
The Right Reverend Thomas Casady was the third missionary bishop of Oklahoma and the first diocesan bishop of the Diocese of Oklahoma of the Episcopal Church, USA.-Life and career:...
, Oklahoma Governor William J. Holloway, and Oklahoma humorist, Will Rogers
Will Rogers
William "Will" Penn Adair Rogers was an American cowboy, comedian, humorist, social commentator, vaudeville performer, film actor, and one of the world's best-known celebrities in the 1920s and 1930s....
, who closed the unveiling ceremonies.
History since dedication
The area surrounding the statue has been designated as Pioneer Woman State Park.The Pioneer Woman Museum
On September 16th, 1958, the 65th anniverary of the openingLand Run of 1893
The Land Run of 1893, also known as the Cherokee Strip Land Run, marked the opening of the Cherokee Outlet to the public. The run happened on September 16, 1893 at noon with more than 100,000 participants hoping to claim land. The land offices for the run were set up in Perry, Enid, Woodward, and...
of the Cherokee Outlet
Cherokee Outlet
The Cherokee Outlet, often mistakenly referred to as the Cherokee Strip, was located in what is now the state of Oklahoma, in the United States. It was a sixty-mile wide strip of land south of the Oklahoma-Kansas border between the 96th and 100th meridians. It was about 225 miles long and in 1891...
which included the land of Ponca City, the state opened the Pioneer Woman Museum, on land adjacent to the monument. An image of the Pioneer Woman statue serves as the de facto logo of the museum.
Physical characteristics
The bronze statue itself stands 17 feet (5.2 m) tall and weighs 12000 pounds (5,443.1 kg). It stands on a pyramidal stepped base of granite blocks which brings the total height of the monument to 40 feet (12.2 m). Marland's plans originally called for a monument from 40 to 70 feet high which was lauded as "second only in size to the Statue of LibertyStatue of Liberty
The Statue of Liberty is a colossal neoclassical sculpture on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, designed by Frédéric Bartholdi and dedicated on October 28, 1886...
".
The statue faces to the southwest, symbolising that the majority of the settlers had come from the northeast.
There is a plaque on the first step beneath the statue which reads:
Depictions
The image of the Pioneer Woman has long been a symbol of Ponca City.In 1941 as part of their 50th anniversary celebrations the General Federation of Women's Clubs
General Federation of Women's Clubs
The General Federation of Women's Clubs , founded in 1890, is an international women's organization dedicated to community improvement by enhancing the lives of others through volunteer service...
presented gold and bronze medals with a bas-relief of the Pioneer Woman to prominent and long-standing members.
The statue is also the official emblem of the four-state Ozark Frontier Trail.
When the State Quarter for Oklahoma was to be issued in 2008, there was a statewide call for proposals to be sent to the Mint for final design work. From the thousands of designs received, five were sent along to the mint. Four of the five submitted designs included the Pioneer Woman. When the professional designs returned from the mint in order for the people of Oklahoma to decide on the final design by voting amongst them, none of the designs included the book which is held under the Pioneer Woman's arm. As this book is often thought to be a Bible
Bible
The Bible refers to any one of the collections of the primary religious texts of Judaism and Christianity. There is no common version of the Bible, as the individual books , their contents and their order vary among denominations...
, this was viewed as an attempt at censorship by the government and caused a statewide controversy. Eventually the fifth design was selected.
That the book was intended to be the Bible was made clear by Baker in an interview in which he stated, "In trying to symbolize the Pioneer Woman of America I wanted to depict Courage and Faith... The Bible was a vital factor in building up this country, and it often was the one indispensable book, recording the facts of the family life, of births, marriages and death and often the only reading material available for mothers to teach their children to read and write in those days."
Derivative works
There have been several notable works of sculpture proposed or produced in the years following the unveiling of the Pioneer Woman based on it. The first one was the Kansas Pioneer Woman Memorial. A competition by the Pioneer Women's Memorial association was held and, as in the competition for the Ponca City statue, Bryant Baker was the winner. A Kansas critic at the time pointed out, "There is a striking similarity in the appearance of the two works despite many actual differences." However this version of a Kansas monument was never completed. In 1937 the Pioneer Women's Memorial association presided over the unveiling of the Kansas Pioneer Memorial by Kansas born sculptor Merrell Gage, a work very different from Bakers.In 1959 a 36' tall fiberglass sculpture by Gordon Shumaker was produced to commemorate the first 100 years of the Minnesota State Fair
Minnesota State Fair
The Minnesota State Fair is the state fair of the U.S. state of Minnesota. Its slogan is "The Great Minnesota Get-Together." It is the 2nd largest fair in the United States, and the largest state fair in the United States in terms of average daily attendance, though the State Fair of Texas runs...
. It stands in front of the Pioneer Building. Like the Ponca City statue it depicts a bonneted woman in ankle length dress striding forward, and like its predecessor she holds a large book/Bible in her right crooked arm as well as carrying a large bundle on the same arm. At 36 feet tall she more approaches the monumentality that Marland was originally seeking for his work.
Hardship and Dreams was the title of a sculpture by Dorothy Koelling (1913-2004) unveiled in Wichita, Kansas
Wichita, Kansas
Wichita is the largest city in the U.S. state of Kansas.As of the 2010 census, the city population was 382,368. Located in south-central Kansas on the Arkansas River, Wichita is the county seat of Sedgwick County and the principal city of the Wichita metropolitan area...
on June 28, 1994. A newspaper article at that time described the work as being, "inspired by the monumental 'Pioneer Woman' in in Ponca City, Okla." Koeling's 6 foot tall statue depicts the bonneted pioneer woman, carrying a large book/Bible and bundle in her right arm, marching forward with her flatfooted son , whose hand she holds, next to her.