I (Mama Blaster) am a proud graduate of the University of Texas. As a student who earned a degree in US History (concentrating on the period from 1789-1877), I always felt it was wrong that a statue of a traitor who held vile beliefs and made war on the United States to defend and preserve cruel human slavery stood in such a prominent place at the University of Texas. This statue was erected in 1933, many decades into the public "rebranding" of the Confederate cause in the South as a noble "Lost Cause."
After 25 years of controversy (which raged even when I was an undergraduate in the 1980s), on 30 Aug 2015 this controversial statue and its complicated legacy was FINALLY removed and reckoned with: (
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"Crews remove Jefferson Davis, Woodrow Wilson statues from UT Main Mall
by Ralph K.M. Haurwitz American-Statesman Staff
1:29 p.m Sunday, Aug. 30, 2015 Local News
CREWS REMOVE JEFFERSON DAVIS, WOODROW WILSON STATUES FROM UT MAIN MALL
Statues of Jefferson Davis and Woodrow Wilson were removed Sunday from the limestone pedestals at the University of Texas on which they have stood for 82 years.
“This is an iconic moment. It really shows the power of student leadership,” said Gregory Vincent, UT’s vice president for diversity and community engagement, referring to a Student Government resolution that called for removing the statue of Davis, president of the Confederate states, from its prominent setting on the university’s Main Mall.
The larger-than-life-size Davis statue and the equally imposing statue of Wilson, the nation’s 28th president, which had stood opposite that of Davis on the mall, were loaded onto a flatbed trailer to be hauled by a pickup to UT’s facilities complex just east of Interstate 35 for refurbishing.
The Davis statue will be installed in 18 months or so in UT’s Briscoe Center for American History after the center is renovated, and Wilson’s will be placed at a yet-to-be-decided outdoor location on campus, according to university officials.
UT announced that it would remove the statues from their pedestals on the Main, or South, Mall after the Texas Division of the Sons of Confederate Veterans failed to get traction Friday at the state Supreme Court with a last-ditch effort to block the plan.
About 50 people turned out to watch the removal of the Davis statue, according to a spokeswoman for the UT Police Department.
“I think it’s a good idea,” said Sandra Bieri, a 1961 UT graduate and retired law firm librarian. “It’s overdue.”
Kirk Lyons, the Confederate group’s lawyer, said he would press on with a legal fight to return “Brother Jeff” and “Brother Woodrow,” as he calls them, to the mall. He said UT’s action amounts to “ISIS-style cleansing of history,” a reference to the Islamic State group’s destruction of statues and other cultural artifacts in the Mideast.
When UT President Gregory L. Fenves announced his decision earlier this month to move the statues, he said it was no longer in the university’s best interest to memorialize the Confederate leader on the Main Mall. Because of the Confederacy’s effort to preserve slavery, it had been vandalized numerous times over the years, most recently in June when the words “black lives matter” were painted on its base.
It took workers about an hour and a half to remove the Davis statue from its pedestal, a procedure they began by wrapping the bronze likeness in plastic. Straps were used to attach the statue to the padded prongs of a heavy-duty forklift.
The work was done by UT’s contractor, Austin-based Vault Fine Art Services. The company’s co-owner and project manager, J. Patrick Sheehy, operated the forklift as well as a saw that he used to cut pins attaching the statue’s bronze base to the limestone pedestal. The same procedure was used to lift the Wilson statue.
Although opposition to the Davis statue surfaced even before it was installed in 1933, the tipping point came this summer with a confluence of events: the Student Government resolution, recommendations from an advisory panel and reduced national tolerance for Confederate symbols after the fatal shooting of nine black churchgoers in South Carolina. The issue had special resonance for UT, which didn’t admit blacks until it was forced to do so in 1950 by the U.S. Supreme Court.
UT was influenced in its early days by sympathizers with the Confederacy, including George Washington Littlefield, a Confederate officer, regent and benefactor who nearly 100 years ago commissioned the statues of Davis, Wilson and four other people, all of which were arrayed along the Main Mall, a long stretch of paved plaza, sidewalks, grass and live oaks with a fountain at its southern tip.
Interestingly, Pompeo Coppini, the sculptor commissioned by Littlefield, expressed misgivings, writing, “As time goes by, they will look to the Civil War as a blot on the pages of American history, and the Littlefield Memorial will be resented as keeping up the hatred between the Northern and Southern states.”
Fenves decided against moving statues of Confederate Gens. Robert E. Lee and Albert Sidney Johnston, Confederate Postmaster John H. Reagan and James Stephen Hogg, the first native-born governor of Texas and the son of a Confederate general. The four had deeper ties to Texas than did Davis, Fenves said."
Nearly two years later, in April 2017, the statue of Jefferson Davis has been refurbished and placed on display at the Briscoe Center for American History on campus, part of an exhibit on the history of the statue and its ties to one of the University's most important and prominent 19th century leaders: Former Confederate Army Major George W. Littlefield.
An Austin American Statesman columnist whose column was reprinted on the Dallas Morning News editorial page reads as follows: (
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"Jefferson Davis statue returns to University of Texas
By Ken Herman
Published Apr 7, 2017
AUSTIN, Texas -- The fourth (and final?) home of the Jefferson Davis statue that spent 82 years in a University of Texas place of honor is an exhibit that centers more on the controversial statue than the Confederate statesman it depicts.
Standing 8 feet, 6 inches and freshly restored and unwrapped, the Davis statue now is at the Briscoe Center for American History (itself freshly restored and soon-to-be unwrapped) in an exhibit titled, "From Commemoration to Education."
As you recall, the statue was removed from UT's South Mall Aug. 30, 2015, after the latest round of protests about it. UT President Gregory Fenves decided the Briscoe Center would be a more appropriate place.
The statue, originally cast in Brooklyn, was shipped to Chicago for rehab work.
"His patina has been restored," said Ben Wright, a Briscoe Center assistant director.
His patina, yes. But there is no effort to restore Davis's shine. The well-sourced exhibit makes no attempt to do so. The display is about the statue's interesting history.
"We're basically telling the history of the statue because by knowing the history of the statue we will hopefully get people to understand why it was there, where it came from, what the intention was and why it's not a bad thing to have moved it to where it is now," said Don Carleton, the Briscoe Center's executive director.
"That's the concept, to explain for those people who would like to have destroyed it, that it is in fact the work of an artist and we're not into destroying art any more than we are into burning books," Carleton said.
Before it was unceremoniously removed from campus, UT long struggled to find the words to explain why a statue of a Confederate leader had a place of honor on campus. Now UT is explaining why it's back.
The exhibit offers a frank recounting of the history of the statue, which previously stood in a downtown bank building, Congress Avenue and the South Mall with other statues. The display text notes that Pompeo Coppini's statue of Davis was moved in 2015 "after an intense period of discussion and protest."
We're also told, "The memorial and its campus setting and context changed significantly over the course of its development."
"The Davis statue has intermittently been the focus of student ire, academic debate and official university investigation, especially since 1990. No longer an object of commemoration, the statue now forms part of an exhibit that explores the statue's history, as well as its significance as both a work of art and evidence of the past," the exhibit says.
There's also a lot about wealthy former UT Regent George Littlefield, who commissioned the statue. The exhibit quotes a 1918 newspaper article noting, Littlefield belonged "to the Old South. He loves its history and traditions. He is zealous of those things which the generation that is now rapidly passing away stood for and believed in."
Another exhibit label recalls that Littlefield, in a 1918 letter to the founder of the Jefferson Davis Homestead Association, hailed Davis as "the greatest man the south ever produced."
Lest someone think otherwise, the exhibit says, "the statue's presence in an educational exhibit -- as opposed to a place of honor on campus -- underlines the fact that Davis, as well as many of his ideas and actions, are no longer commemorated or endorsed by the university."
Wright said the display, an expanded version of what will become the permanent display, is about "the journey we believe the statue has made."
The exhibit includes fascinating documentation about the statue's history, including this April 22, 1920, telegram from Elizabeth Coppini to her husband Pompeo during early contract negotiations in Austin about the statue: "WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THE CONTRACT AM WORRIED WIRE LIZZIE"
He did, five days later: "FOR GODS SAKE QUIT WORRING EVERYTHING ALL RIGHT HOME FRIDAY POMPO"
Carleton said he expects to hear some complaints about the display from those upset that the statue is displayed anywhere and from those upset about the move of a what they see as "a sacred, holy sculpture that represents the best and brightest of his generation in the South."
"I'm sure I'll get it later," he said of complaints, "probably sooner instead of later."
Wright said, "There may be some people who think it should be in a crate in storage."
Speaking of storage, some of you might remember that the day they removed Davis' statue from the South Mall, UT crews also removed a statue of President Woodrow Wilson that stood opposite -- for symmetry, officials said. It is not yet making a public comeback.
"The Woodrow Wilson statue has been cleaned and returned to storage here at UT," said spokeswoman Shilpa Bakre. "There are no future plans for it at this time."
It's a funny thing about statues, Wright said. "They stand on plinths but there are really cultural foundations which hold them up," he said. "And that cultural foundation shifts."
"History," Wright noted, "can be really gnarly."
The remodeled Briscoe Center opens Monday. And I'd be interested in your thoughts about the Davis statue display. I think it's well done.
I'm less interested in your thoughts about the photos in the display of sculptor Coppini in his underwear. Like history itself, historical photos can be gnarly."