Standing Lincoln,” an important piece of art owned by the school, returned to the Edsel Ford Memorial Library for the first time since the space closed for renovations on April 3, 2024.

The statue is a reduction of a large-scale bronze sculpture of the same name by Augustus Saint-Gaudens, which stands in Lincoln Park, Chicago. The reduction was given to the school in 1939 by Homer Sawyer, class of 1909.

What prompted Mr. Sawyer to give the school the piece or how he came to have it are questions that are yet to be answered. However, we do know that earlier that year the school’s eight-foot tall plaster version of Lincoln, purchased by the second head of school Mr. Huber Buehler from Caproni Brothers in Boston, began to deteriorate. (It was also the victim of numerous pranks.) The plaster Lincoln was given to Housatonic Valley Regional High School, where it still resides. The gift from Sawyer might have been an effort to replace this plaster version.

The bronze version of “Standing Lincoln” has been placed in many parts of the school; it first stood in the original Main Building, before being moved to the south end of the library in 1953. After the 1996 renovation of the Main Building, it was placed in the Seminar Room and spent time in the hallway outside the math and history wing before being returned to the library.

Conservation was carried out by Williamstown Art Conservation. The work was prompted by last year’s library renovation, which necessitated moving and storing the statue. Ms. Joan Baldwin, curator of special collections, said, “We decided to kill two birds with one stone and have the statue cleaned and additional work done on the base.”

The goal of the restoration was to remove active areas of corrosion, repair damaged coating, and reintegrate areas of patina loss. A protective sacrificial paste wax coating was also applied to the surface of the sculpture.

Ms. Baldwin reported that there are 16 or 17 other reproductions of the “Standing Lincoln” in existence, including at Yale, Harvard, and in the American Wing at the Metropolitan. Astrid Bingham ’28 said, “I feel proud that Hotchkiss can sit next to those other big names.”

One reduction, presented by the American ambassador to the U.K., currently stands in Parliament Square in London; another, presented by former president Lyndon Johnson to the people of Mexico, is located in Mexico City.

There has generally been a positive reaction to the restoration and return of the statue. Ms. Baldwin said, “I hope people think about Lincoln—the person he was and the way St. Gaudens chose to represent him.” Charlotte Macaffee ’28 said, “I really like how they’ve kept it through the years. The renovation definitely made the library more modern looking, but I think the statue brings back some reminiscence of old Hotchkiss.”