when were the statues on monument avenue built
Monument Avenue Monument Avenue is an avenue in Richmond, Virginia with a tree-lined grassy mall dividing the east- and westbound traffic and is punctuated by statues memorializing Virginian Confederate participants of the American Civil War, including Robert E. Lee, J.E.B. Stuart, Jefferson Davis, Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, and Matthew Fontaine Maury. There is also a monument to Arthur Ashe, a Richmond native and international tennis star who was African-American. The first monument, a statue of Robert E. Lee, was erected in 1890. Between 1900 and 1925, Monument Avenue greatly expanded with architecturally significant houses, churches and apartment buildings.[4]
Robert Edward Lee (sculpture) Shrady was chronically ill at the time of the commission – he worked on it slowly but it was still unfinished on his death in 1922. Leo Lentelli (1879–1961) completed the sculpture in 1924, and it was dedicated on May 21 of that year. It was cast in the Roman Bronze Works of Brooklyn, New York. Comparison with a surviving model of the proposed statue by Shrady reveals Lentelli's version is less animated than that intended by Shrady. The sculpture is approximately 26 feet high, 12 feet long, and 8 feet wide at the bottom of the pedestal. The oval granite pedestal was designed by the architect Walter Blair and on its side has the inscription "Robert Edward Lee" with the dates 1807 and 1870.[3]