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Dr. Mary McLe Journey to S
First Steps
In March of 2016, Gov. Rick Scott signed a law to replace the statue of Confederate Gen. Edmund Kirby Smith, which had been donated to the U. S. Capitol for display in Statuary Hall in 1922, with a new“ Great Floridian.”
The search for a new sculpture was conducted by the Florida Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, which reviewed 3,587 submissions. The list was narrowed to 130 eligible names, including Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune, who received 1,233 votes, easily outpacing the second-place subject which received 447 votes.
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Fundraising Effort
In late 2018, the Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune Statuary Fund, Inc., was formed to raise private funds for the statuary project. Nearly 400 individual donors have contributed to the effort.
Statuary Hall
Occupying the space originally used as the chamber for the House of Representatives, the National Statuary Hall was created after Congress invited each of the states to contribute two statues of prominent citizens for permanent display. Initially all of the contributed statues were housed in the space, as the collection grew more space was needed. In 1933 Congress authorized the display of the statues throughout the Capitol. It is one of the most popular rooms in the U. S. Capitol Building, with thousands of visitors passing through every day.
In addition to raising funds for the marble statue which will be placed in National Statuary Hall, the Board expanded the fundraising effort and commissioned a bronze statue of Mary Mcleod Bethune from the same maquette to be displayed in Riverfront Esplanade Park in downtown Daytona Beach, Florida. They broadened their vision and fundraising to include a feature-length documentary and K-12 curriculum module, the sponsorship of five B-CU graduates to perform at the blessing ceremony of the statue in Pietrasanta, Italy and the temporary exhibit of the marble statue in Daytona Beach, Florida prior to the permanent placement in the U. S. Capitol.
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