While the French and American governments dithered, Bartholdi made the statue a reality by his own entrepreneurship, vision, and determination. He also came up with inventive ideas to raise money, including exhibiting the torch at the Phildaelphia world's fair and charging people to climb up inside. Grant, Joseph Pulitzer, Victor Hugo, Gustave Eiffel, and Thomas Edison - to help his scheme. There he enlisted the help of notable people of the age - including Ulysses S. A young sculptor inspired by a trip to Egypt where he saw the pyramids and Sphinx, he traveled to America, carrying with him the idea of a colossal statue of a woman. Bartholdi not only forged this 151-foot-tall colossus in a workshop in Paris and transported her across the ocean, but battled to raise money for the statue and make her a reality.

American school children grow up believing that the Statue of Liberty was a gift from a grateful French nation to celebrate America’s 100th birthday in 1876. For decades, the myth has persisted that the statue was a grand gift from France, but now Liberty's Torch reveals how she was in fact the pet project of one quixotic and visionary French sculptor, Fr d ric Auguste Bartholdi. As America celebrates her 238th birthday, LIBERTY’S TORCH by Elizabeth Mitchell is an entertaining and informative history of the building of Miss Liberty. The Statue of Liberty is one of the most recognizable monuments in the world, a powerful symbol of freedom and the American dream. : Libertys Torch: The Great Adventure to Build the Statue of Liberty (9780802123794) by Mitchell, Elizabeth and a great selection of similar New, Used and Collectible Books available now at great prices.

Liberty's Torch by Elizabeth Mitchell