Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 90.djvu/229

 Enlightened Liberty Enlightens the World

��Bartholdi's famous statue now sends out

THE Statue of Libert\ , gift of the republic of France to the United States, has been brought out of the darkness that has hid- den her every night these thirty years, and henceforth she will be bathed in the perpetual day- light of the incandescent lamp.

In many re- spects the light- ing of Barthol- di's famous statue is the most remark- able work of its kind in America. It may be regarded as the climax of three years' effort and development in the art called "flood-light- ing." The Wool- worth tower was the first perma- nently flood- lighted building and the lessons learned in this installation were out with notable in the flood-lighting of the Panama-Pacific Ex- position.

The idea of applying this dignified and impres- sive method of lighting the Statue of Liberty was conceived in 1915. A popular fund-raising cam- paign was conducted by a New York city news- paper and the statue made her debut as a permanent lighting spectacle during America's "electric week."

���bvilk into a goddess bathed in a permanent flood of light. The sources of light are completely concealed

��carried success

��JHOIE CONDUIT

��? Mou coNoorr

���A diagram of the electrical installation, showing the po- sitions of the projectors

��its message by night as well as day

Except for a slight modifica- tion of the torch, nothing was added or taken away from the statue. The purpose of the designers was to transform the dull lantern in Liber-* ty's hand into a flaming torch. This was accom- plished by re- moving the somewhat crude steelwork, which, in a way, had distorted the classic contour of the torch, and sub- stituting sheet bronze for it. The whole torch was thus rebuilt to obtain a bronze flame of the shape and size originally intended by Bartholdi. Gut- zon Borglum, the sculptor, supervised this work.

When the torch flame was completed all the bronze plates were cut out, leaving as a skeleton riveted lines about an inch in width. These plates were then used to construct molds upon which pieces of glass were bent. In selecting the glass Mr. Borglum picked out three tones of yellow cathedral glass. A dull surface was preferred to avoid the blinding noon- day glare of a rich reflec- tive surface. The lightest tint was used to simulate the tip of the flame, with

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