Gallaudet Memorial Statue - Fulton, MO
Posted by: 
YoSam.
N 38° 50.892 W 091° 56.413
15S E 591965 N 4300464
Alice Cogswell, standing on a feather and safe in Father Gallaudet's hands.
Waymark Code: WM4VVG
Location: Missouri, United States
Date Posted: 10/03/2008
Views: 12
Sculptor: Frances Laughlin Wadsworth (1909-1978).
Date Statue Erected: May 1960.
County of Statue: Callaway County.
Location of Statue: State St., entrance loop to Missouri School for the Deaf, Fulton.
Description of Statue:
A portrait of a young Alice Cogswell emerging from a huge pair of open hands. She stands with her proper right hand resting on the finger tip of one of the hands and her proper left hand clasping a book to her chest. At the foot of the sculpture is an open book and a quill pen. The sculpture rests on a square base.
Text on Base:
Donated by Alumni, Staff,
Students and Friends of
MISSOURI SCHOOL FOR THE DEAF
Honoring
Rev. THOMAS HOPKINS GALLAUDET
Father of Education of the deaf in
America
Erected May 1960Text of School Sign:
Missouri School for the Deaf
There are none so deaf....as those that will not hear. There are none so blind...as those that will not see."Mathew Henry
Remarks:
It honors Rev. Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet, considered the Father of education of the deaf in America. The young girl portrayed, Alice Cogswell (1805-1831), was the daughter of Dr. Mason Fitch Cogswell of Hartford, Connecticut, and her deafness motivated Gallaudet to push for a special school for the deaf. He and ten other men in Hartford raised enough money to send Gallaudet to Europe to learn how to start a school. Alice was the first pupil enrolled in the American Asylum for the Deaf (later the American School for the Deaf) which opened in 1817 in Hartford. The sculpture is commonly referred to as "Little Alice."
The large pair of hands depicted in the sculpture are those of Rev. Gallaudet. The sculpture is a copy of a nine-foot high sculpture by Frances Wadsworth erected at the American School for the Deaf in Hartford, Connecticut in 1953.