On what date was New York’s Statue of Liberty dedicated?
Answer
October 28, 1886
New York’s Statue of Liberty was dedicated on October 28, 1886.
The dedication ceremony took place on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, then called Bedloe’s Island. President Grover Cleveland presided, and a large parade through Manhattan preceded the ceremony. The statue was a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States, commemorating the countries’ republican ideals and their historical alliance.
French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi designed the statue, while Gustave Eiffel helped engineer its internal framework. The copper statue was built in France, shipped across the Atlantic in crates, and assembled on a pedestal constructed in New York. Fundraising for the American pedestal was supported by a public campaign led by publisher Joseph Pulitzer.
The statue is formally titled Liberty Enlightening the World. Its tablet displays the date July 4, 1776, in Roman numerals, while a broken chain lies beneath its feet. The dedication date is sometimes confused with 1876, when the statue’s torch-bearing arm was displayed at Philadelphia’s Centennial Exposition.