Statue of Liberty, Copper statue on Liberty Island, New York Harbor, United States
The Statue of Liberty is a copper figure on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, its skin hammered over an iron framework engineered by Gustave Eiffel. The robed woman raises a gold-leafed torch in her right hand and holds a tabula ansata inscribed JULY IV MDCCLXXVI against her left side. A crown of seven spikes sits above a band with rectangular openings, and her left foot rests on a broken chain and shackle.
French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi designed the figure in the late 19th century as a gift marking the centennial of American independence. The 350 individual pieces were shipped from France and assembled in 1886 on Bedloe's Island, with Gustave Eiffel engineering the supporting iron framework for the copper sheets.
The figure depicts Libertas, the Roman goddess of liberty, and the tablet's Roman numerals give the date of the Declaration of Independence, July 4, 1776. The broken chain under her left foot commemorates the national abolition of slavery after the American Civil War. From 1886 until the age of aviation, millions of immigrants crossing the Atlantic saw her as their first view of the United States.
Ferries leave from Battery Park in Manhattan and Liberty State Park in New Jersey; the crown is reached by a narrow spiral stair of 377 steps and only a limited number of visitors are admitted each day. The torch balcony has been closed to the public since 1916. The pedestal and statue reopened in 2013 after Hurricane Sandy.
The copper skin is only as thick as two pennies stacked together and changed color over roughly three decades through natural oxidation from brown to green. This green patina now protects the underlying metal from further corrosion and has become the defining feature of the figure.
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