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Forsyth Fountain

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1858, Janes, Beebe and Company, after Michel Joseph Napoléon Liénard; 1960–1961, 1974 repairs; 1988 restoration. Forsyth Park

Situated at the original center of Forsyth Place, the cast-iron Forsyth Fountain remains the stunning focal point of the enlarged park. The fountain is possibly the first large-scale cast-iron fountain within the United States and is the earliest with zinc statues. It was created and installed in 1858 by the New York firm of Janes, Beebe and Company, which a year later received the contract to cast the structural and decorative iron for the U.S. Capitol dome. The company closely modeled this design on the cast-iron fountain displayed in 1851 at the Crystal Palace in London, which was created by Liénard and manufactured by the J.-P.-V. André Iron Foundry of Paris. Forsyth Park’s fountain was originally painted with brown graining to simulate Siena marble. All of the original zinc figures—Cornucopia at the top, the Herons and Water Grasses between the two basins, the Tritons at the base and Swans in the larger pool—were replaced with bronze copies in 1974. Janes, Kirtland and Company (successor to Janes, Beebe and Company) displayed a copy of the fountain at the 1876 Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia, which afterward was erected in Madison, Indiana. Two other copies exist, in Poughkeepsie, New York (1870), and Cuzco, Peru.

Writing Credits

Author: 
Robin B. Williams with David Gobel, Patrick Haughey, Daves Rossell, and Karl Schuler
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Citation

Robin B. Williams with David Gobel, Patrick Haughey, Daves Rossell, and Karl Schuler, "Forsyth Fountain", [Savannah, Georgia], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/GA-02-10.1.1.

Print Source

Buildings of Savannah, Robin B. Williams. With David Gobel, Patrick Haughey, Daves Rossell, and Karl Schuler. Charlottesville: University of Virginia Press, 2016, 179-180.

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