Alfonso Iannelli Alfonso Iannelli Alfonso Iannelli (February 17, 1888 - March 23, 1965) was an Italian-American sculptor, artist, and industrial designer. Based in Chicago for most of his life, Iannelli was born in Andretta, Italy on February 17, 1888. He came to America in 1898. He studied to be a sculptor under Gutzon Borglum, later famous for Mount Rushmore. From 1910 to 1915, he designed posters for the vaudeville acts appearing at the Orpheum Theatre in Los Angeles. Frank Lloyd Wright's son John saw his work, and the two became friends. John introduced Iannelli's work to his father, Frank Lloyd Wright, who
Gutzon Borglum a high-relief frieze of Lee, Jefferson Davis, and 'Stonewall' Jackson riding around the mountain, followed by a legion of artillery troops. Borglum agreed to include a Ku Klux Klan altar in his plans for the memorial to acknowledge a request of Helen Plane in 1915, who wrote to him: "I feel it is due to the KKK that saved us from Negro domination and carpetbag rule, that it be immortalized on Stone Mountain". After a delay caused by World War I, Borglum and the newly chartered Stone Mountain Confederate Monumental Association set to work on this unexampled monument, the size