Updated: 10:53 AM EST Feb 25, 2021
Many have heard the name Mary McLeod Bethune, but do not know the woman and her story. Born in Mayesville, South Carolina, in 1875, Mary McLeod Bethune came to Central Florida just before the turn of the century. Determined to give an education to Black women, in 1904, with just $1.50 to her name, Mary McLeod Bethune started The Educational and Industrial Training School for Negro Girls. Today, the small house which bore her school sits on the edge of her university: Bethune-Cookman University.While growing her educational institution, Dr. Bethune became a presence on the national stage."She was a counselor to several presidents. She was the founder of the National Council of Negro Women. She was the co-creator of the iconic United Negro College Fund 144, and she just happened to start a great university," said Dr. LaBrent Chrite, the current president of BC-U. Becoming close friends with Eleanor and President Franklin Roosevelt, in 1933 Mary McLeod Bethune created the Federal Council of Negro Affairs. Known as Roosevelt's Black Cabinet, the group advised the president and others after him on a range of issues impacting Black Americans.In 1945, Dr. Bethune accompanied President Harry Truman to the founding conference of the United Nations. She was the only Black woman to attend. "Beyond the campus and beyond our community, there are many people who don't know the significance of Mary McLeod Bethune 's accomplishments, and she was amazing," said Nancy Lohman, who is working to make sure the world knows Mary McLeod Bethune. Because of all those things, Mary McLeod Bethune is about to be memorialized with an incredibly rare honor.She will be one of the two Floridians to represent the state in the U.S. Capitol's Statuary Hall. Mary McLeod Bethune will also be the first African American to represent a state there.Lohman is the chair of the Dr. Mary McLeod Statuary Fund and a driving force behind the project."It is truly a project that represents all of us. But particularly, of course, our community, the state of Florida, all African Americans, all women. I mean, this is a project that I want everyone to embrace," Lohman said.The statue of Mary McLeod Bethune is now in the final stages of completion.For almost three years, Nilda Comas has been studying every aspect of Mary McLeod Bethune."I studied all her smiles and how she expressed herself the way she turned her head in the pictures the way she stood," Comas said. "I have to know the person I have to feel like I know, to get the expressions, and the right posture." She studied her, to sculpt her. Comas is bringing Mary McLeod Bethune back to life in 16-feet of marble honed from Michelangelo's caves in the Tuscan mountainsides of Italy."It's like the biggest honor in history that you can give a person is to do a sculpture in marble," Comas said. Comas landed the job before Florida chose the person she'd be sculpting to go to the U.S. Capitol.One of 11 finalists for the honor, and the only woman, Comas was the only sculptor in the group who could work in marble."I think that had a lot to do with me getting chosen," she said. Just like Mary McLeod Bethune will be the first African American to represent a state in Statuary Hall, Comas is also a first. "I will be the first Hispanic woman to sculpt a woman in the for the Capitol, National Statuary Hall," Comas said. In Italy for the last year, Comas has been developing the statue. First, she created it in clay, to fine-tune every detail.From there, she's used centuries-old techniques to copy it to the marble stone. Now she's cutting, chiseling, etching the raw slab into a vision. "She's 70% complete it. And so, yeah, you can already see, you know, her smile and her... you don't have all the details, but it's there, everything is there already," Comas said of her progress. Back in the states earlier this month and talking only to WESH 2 News, Comas gave more exclusive details about the work of art."She's going to be the only sculpture in the Capitol with a cap and gown. So it's going to be striking, just that and also the fact that she has a black rose," Comas said. The black rose was one of Dr. Bethune's favorite flowers and symbols. In her other hand, she'll have the cane famously given to her by President Roosevelt. Though Dr. Bethune will be wearing academic robes, Comas left them open, to reveal her sense of style. It's also a nod to her work as a civil rights leader.Comas is now back in Italy to finish the sculpture, and ready it to ship to the U.S. Capitol.Before she left, WESH 2 News asked Comas about the detail she's most excited to see come to life, as she finishes the work. "I think it is her expression? Yes. Because it's like everything else follows her expression. That's like the key. Like when we're there, and we look at her, you know, I wanted to be where people fall in love with her feel her kindness and her strength. It, you know, is a balance between strength and kindness," Comas said. There is a deadline for the statue to be finished: It's slated for a send-off blessing, an Italian tradition, on May 7.The State of Florida and Statuary committee have requested the statue be placed in the Capitol on July 10.