Pioneer Mother - Eugene, Oregon
Posted by: 
DougK
N 44° 02.650 W 123° 04.546
10T E 493929 N 4876781
Pioneer Mother is a figurative sculpture on the University of Oregon campus.
Waymark Code: WMFGVC
Location: Oregon, United States
Date Posted: 10/18/2012
Views: 3
Pioneer Mother is a figurative sculpture on the
University of Oregon campus. It is a large sculpture, about 6 x 4 x 6 feet sitting a a granite base about 6 ft. x 4 ft. 8 in. x 6 ft. 8 in. in size.
From the Smithsonian AIC Description:
A female figure wearing a long flowing gown seated in Romanesque chair. Her hair is pulled in a bun and a shawl drapes over her shoulders. Her hands rest on an open Bible in her lap. Low-relief panels attached to base depict various scenes from the lives of pioneers.
From the Smithsonian AIC Remarks:
Donated by Burt Brown Barker, who was the vice president of the University of Oregon in 1932. Figure was to honor his own pioneer mother, Elvira Chadwick Brown Matheny (b. 1844).
A plaque on the front base reads:
|
|
THE
PIONEER MOTHER
"Others have perpetuated her struggles;
I want to perpetuate the peace which followed
her struggles. Others have perpetuated her
adventure. I want to perpetuate the spirit
which made the adventure possible and the
joy which crowned her declining years as
She looked upon the fruits of her labor and
caught but a faint glimpse of what it will
mean for posterity.
I want to recall her as I recall my
mother, Elvira Brown Barker, a pioneer of
1847, in the sunset of her life, after the
hardships and the battles and the sorrows
of pioneering were past and she sat in the
afterglow of her twilight days resting
from her labors. All her hardships and
sorrows have softened in the telling in
her later life, and her rugged endurance
has mellowed with her fading memory; but
to us there lives that spirit of conquering
peace which I wish posterity to remember."
May 7, 1932 Bert Brown Barker
|