GEN. U. S. GRANT MEMORIAL
Congress authorized the erection of the statue on public grounds in the National Capital, and the Commission of Fine Arts advised in the matter of location and design of the pedestal.
In May, 1916, the commission received a communication from Mme. Carlo Polifeme, President Fondatrice, Le Lyceum Société des Femmes de France à New York, to this effect:
Le Lyceum Société des Femmes de France à New York, in a spirit of patriotism, nurtured by exile, inspired with a deep sense of the friendship that binds our two sister Republics, animated by a sympathy born of closer and closer relations, “Le Lyceum” intends to perpetuate these sentiments by erecting, in their new home, a monument to Jeanne d’Arc, emblem of Patriotism, emblem of Love and Peace. The statue of our French heroine will be built to the glory of womanhood, dedicated by the women of France in New York to the women of America, and offered to the city of Washington.
The President and his excellency the French ambassador attended the unveiling, which took place on January 6, 1922, the five hundred and tenth anniversary of the birth of Jeanne d’Arc.
The life of Jeanne d’Arc has been eulogized by the greatest of writers, and to-day she is revered as one of the world’s great liberators. Her spirit of patriotism and devotion has thrilled the ages.
STATUE OF DANTE
The statue of Dante, standing in Meridian Hill Park, was given to the National Capital by Chevalier Carlo Barsotti, editor of Il Progresso Italo-Americano, in behalf of the Italians of the United States in commemoration of the six hundredth anniversary of the death of Dante Alighieri, and unveiled on December 1, 1921. It is in bronze, 12 feet high, and is the work of Commendatore Ettore Ximenes, sculptor, of Rome. The artist has represented Dante in the gown of a scholar and crowned with a laurel wreath.
The statue received an appropriate landscape setting upon the completion of the lower garden of Meridian Hill Park.