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| STATUES ON MACHINERY HALL - The statues on the
pediments of Machinery Hall were notable
for their grace and beauty, being in nearly all cases the figures of
women. The angels on the spires were less becoming, while probably
the most daring examples of modern architectural display. Mr. M. A.
Waagen modeled the figure called "Victory, " of which thirteen casts
were made in copper by W. H. Mullins, of Salem, Ohio, and Robert
Kraus made a second "Victory," of which the same founder cast four
copper replicas. These were the angels that defied the southwest
gales of the Windy City, and not a single statue blew off. The
female figures for the pediments were by Mr. Waagen, and were modeled
by Mr. Waagen in the spring of 1892, in the Forestry Building. They
represented ten of the Sciences, and were thirteen feet high. "The
making of a thirteen-foot angel," wrote Paul Hull at the time, "who
will look as graceful and airy as a hundred-pound girl, is about as
poetic a task as the mining of a ton of coal. Her limbs are made of
two-by-four scantlings; her spinal column is a wrought iron rod. Her
bosom and head are made of broken pieces of lath, and her wings are
steel netting. Hereafter, the main factors in the creation of a
beautiful plaster goddess are a common kitchen dishpan and an
every-day wood-shed hatchet." The creation of heroic statuary at
Jackson Park in the winter of 1892 and 1893 was on a scale probably
never before undertaken, and any but the most rapid methods must have
completely failed. |
