NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA
SMITHSONIAN RECORD IAS LA000262
The statue pictured at left shows a Viquesney-inspired Doughboy located in the city of New Orleans, Louisiana. It was formerly in the center of what is locally known as Billy Goat Park (renamed after WWI to Pershing Place), near the intersection of Tulane and South Galvez, but it was moved after a construction project, and as of November 2014, it now stands near its original location, which is now a part of the new University Medical Center campus.
Note the grenade-throwing arm is bent at a sharper angle and pitched to the back rather than forward, and there is no pair of tree stumps on the base, a Viquesney "hallmark". The statue was dedicated on May 1, 1970, long after Viquesney's death in 1946; the sculptor isn't known.
Page 2 of a New Orleans city planning meeting document dated March 13, 2012, describes this monument as appearing to be a replica of Viquesney's "Spirit of the American Doughboy", and while there are indeed similarities in its pose, the differences described above (and the dedication date) prove it isn't. It's better described as a copy-after.
Curiously, in a list of unspecified "memorials" published around 1936, Viquesney did name New Orleans as the location of one of his creations, but it isn't known what it was. Many of the entries on that list are indeed "The Spirit of the American Doughboy", but others have been found to be just plaques or other non-statue monuments, which is probably the case with the entry for New Orleans.
The statue has a Facebook page.
Note the grenade-throwing arm is bent at a sharper angle and pitched to the back rather than forward, and there is no pair of tree stumps on the base, a Viquesney "hallmark". The statue was dedicated on May 1, 1970, long after Viquesney's death in 1946; the sculptor isn't known.
Page 2 of a New Orleans city planning meeting document dated March 13, 2012, describes this monument as appearing to be a replica of Viquesney's "Spirit of the American Doughboy", and while there are indeed similarities in its pose, the differences described above (and the dedication date) prove it isn't. It's better described as a copy-after.
Curiously, in a list of unspecified "memorials" published around 1936, Viquesney did name New Orleans as the location of one of his creations, but it isn't known what it was. Many of the entries on that list are indeed "The Spirit of the American Doughboy", but others have been found to be just plaques or other non-statue monuments, which is probably the case with the entry for New Orleans.
The statue has a Facebook page.
