Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi 1871, not finishing the massive sandstone statue until 1880. In 1871, he made his first trip to the United States, where he pitched the idea of a massive statue gifted from the French to the Americans in honor of the centennial of American independence. The idea, which had first been broached to him in 1865 by his friend Édouard René de Laboulaye, resulted in the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor. After years of work and fundraising, the statue was inaugurated in 1886. During this period, Bartholdi also sculpted a number of monuments for American cities, such as a
The American Volunteer (statue) based on the Antietam model. Batterson allowed O. Langworthy & Company to photograph the colossal statue at the Rhode Island Granite Works prior to its departure by ship for Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This may have been intended to generate publicity before its formal debut at the Centennial Exposition in May 1876. The statue probably arrived at the Centennial fairgrounds by railroad from the Schuylkill River docks, and in two pieces. The Pennsylvania Railroad had built numerous stub lines, first to deliver construction materials for the Exposition buildings, then to deliver their exhibits. The Main Exhibition Building was the largest building in