Statue of Liberty defeat by the Prussians. One of these was the "Lion of Belfort", a monumental sculpture carved in sandstone below the fortress of Belfort, which during the war had resisted a Prussian siege for over three months. The defiant lion, long and half that in height, displays an emotional quality characteristic of Romanticism, which Bartholdi would later bring to the Statue of Liberty. Bartholdi and Laboulaye considered how best to express the idea of American liberty. In early American history, two female figures were frequently used as cultural symbols of the nation. One of these symbols, the personified Columbia, was seen
Conservation-restoration of the Statue of Liberty as one year beginning in 1984. The statue had been closed only once before for such an extended period of time, and that was at one point in the late 1930s. Later announcements stated that the erection of the scaffolding surrounding the outside of the statue would begin in the fall of 1983, and it was still believed in July 1983 that the restoration would begin sometime in the fall. NPS representatives retracted and revised the earlier announcement concerning the closure of the Island to the public; Liberty Island would in fact remain open and closings would be intermittent and