Conservation Treatment Awards, Mountain Plains Region

Soldiers' & Sailors' Monument, Wichita, Kansas
This 1912 sculpture has four full-length bronze figures, a monumental copper statue, and architecture resembling a Greek temple. Ernest Moore Viquesney was the architect for the monument. He is best known for creating the Doughboy statues that dot the country. Frederick Hibbard studied with Lorado Taft and exhibited at the Chicago Art Institute regularly between 1903 and 1943. Upon his death he bequeathed his plaster casts to the Chicago Historical Society. Friends of the Sedgwick County Soldiers and Sailors Civil War Monument are the applicants. Sedgwick County is the owner.

The Sower, Lincoln, Nebraska
Atop the State Capitol Building in Lincoln, Nebraska, The Sower (1929) by Lee Oskar Lawrie towers 400 feet above the city below. The 19-foot-tall cast bronze figure of a farmer is a symbol of Nebraska’s agricultural industry. Its conservation was part of the restoration of the entire Capitol building. The same sculptor also created Atlas, which stands in front of the International Building at Rockefeller Center in New York City. The State of Nebraska is both owner and applicant.

Sakakawea, Bismarck, North Dakota
The North Dakota Federation of Women's Clubs worked with the State Historical Society of North Dakota to erect the statue in 1910 near the capitol building in Bismarck in honor of the Native American who acted as a guide to Lewis and Clark. Chicago-based sculptor Leonard Crunelle was granted the commission and used Hannah Leavings Grant, Sakakawea's granddaughter, as the model. Spotted Weasel, a well-known Mandan chief, traveled to Chicago to inspect the statue and made recommendations to help Sakakawea look as authentic as possible. Money was raised through donations, school fundraisers, and the sale of North Dakota Christmas seals and postcards. In 1999 the North Dakota Legislative Assembly honored Sakakawea by choosing to replicate this statue and to place it in National Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C. The State of North Dakota owns the sculpture. State Historical Society of North Dakota was the applicant.

Queen of the Sea, Corpus Christi, Texas
Charging only for materials, Pompeo Coppini created Queen of the Sea, Corpus Christi’s first public art, in 1914. The sculpture is meant to embody the city’s change in social attitude as it evolved into a port town. Helen Leary, the model for the maiden in Queen of the Sea, was the second woman to be graduated from law school at the University of Texas at Austin. The City of Corpus Christi’s Art and Cultural Commission oversaw the preservation effort.