Atlas and the Atlas Crater - New York City, NY - Extraterrestrial Locations on Waymarking.com

Located directly across the street from St. Patrick's Cathedrals Fifth Street entrance, this 1937 Atlas is by Lee Lawrie.
The Smithsonian Inventory (visit link) describes the work thusly:

"Full-length nude male figure, standing on bent left leg with right leg extended back. On his shoulders, he holds an armillary sphere comprised of three interlocked rings. The sphere bears the twelve zodiac signs and has an axis pointing to the North Star. "

Wikipedia has an article devoted just to this statue (visit link) and informs us:

"The sculpture is in the Art Deco style, as is the entire Rockefeller Center. Atlas in the sculpture is 15 feet tall, while the entire statue is 45 feet tall,[1][2] as high as a four-story building. It weighs seven tons,[3] and is the largest sculpture at Rockefeller Center.[4] The North-South axis of the armillary sphere on his shoulders points towards the North Star as seen from New York City.[5]

When Atlas was unveiled in 1937, some people protested, claiming that it looked like Italian dictator Benito Mussolini. Later, painter James Montgomery Flagg said that Atlas "looks too much as Mussolini thinks he looks".[6]

It is a symbol of Ayn Rand's Objectivist philosophies and the Objectivist movement."

Wikipedia (visit link) also has an article on the crater which informs us:

"Atlas is a prominent lunar impact crater that is located in the northeast part of the Moon, to the southeast of Mare Frigoris. Just to the west is the slightly smaller but still prominent crater Hercules. Northeast of Atlas is the large Endymion.

The inner wall of Atlas is multiply terraced and the edge slumped, forming a sharp-edged lip. This is a floor-fractured crater with a rough and hilly interior that has a lighter albedo than the surroundings. Floor-fractures are usually created as a result of volcanic modifications.

There are two dark patches along the inner edge of the walls; one along the north edge and another besides the southeast edges. A system of slender clefts named the Rimae Atlas crosses the crater floor, and were created by volcanism. Along the north and northeastern inner sides are a handful of dark-halo craters, most likely due to eruptions. Around the mid-point is a cluster of low central hills arranged in a circular formation."

Atlas was one of the Titans in Greek mythology. Prometheus was one of his brothers...and of course, there is a famous statue of Prometheus nearby at the Rockefeller Center skating rink. Atlas supported the heavens and in some contexts, he and Phoebe are paired in their governance of the Moon. The Atlantic Ocean is named after him...as are the Atlas mountains in Africa. Read more about him at (visit link)

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