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Libertas, the Roman goddess better known as the Statue of Liberty, is 151 feet tall. The pedestal on which the statue stands adds another 89 feet to the overall height of the artwork. More than one-third of the Statue of Libertyâs commanding visual presence is the neoclassical pedestal. Brattleboroâs Richard Morris Hunt was the architect who designed the statueâs base.
In 1865 a prominent French college professor named Edouard de Laboulaye proposed the idea of a monument to honor the United States. The US had just ended its Civil War and abolished slavery. Laboulaye wanted to reaffirm the positive relationship between the people of France and the people of the US. He was an expert on the US Constitution, an abolitionist, and a big fan of Abraham Lincoln.