Mary Lawrence

Mary Lawrence (Tonetti) (1868–1945) was an American sculptor. She designed the Christopher Columbus sculpture at the World's Columbian Exposition. Life Lawrence was born in New York City into a prominent New York family whose ancestors included John Lawrence, mayor of New York City from 1673 to 1675 and 1691–1692, and the War of 1812 patriot, Captain James Lawrence who died after uttering the words, "Tell the men to fire faster! Don't give up the ship!" While in Chicago preparing for the World's Columbian Exposition, sculptor Augustus St. Gaudens recommended Lawrence, who had been his pupil at the Art Students League of New York for the previous five years, for the creation of the monumental statue of Christopher Columbus to be placed at the entrance of the Administration Building. Like many of the buildings at the Exposition, the statue was made of staff, a temporary building material, and no longer exists. Although some critics claimed that St. Gaudens, or his brother Louis, had in fact modelled the work, St. Gaudens himself debunked this by stating in his Reminiscences that Lawrence, "modeled and executed it and to her goes all the credit for the vitality and breadth of treatment which it revealed." St Gaudens biographer Bruce Wilkens relates that Millet objected to the prominent placement of the statue and arranged to have it moved to a spot near the train station. The architect Charles Follen McKim, a founding member of the prestigious architectural firm McKim, Mead and White and a widower, who had fallen in love with Lawrence in New York, had enough sway in Chicago to get the statue of Columbus returned to its former place. Lawrence never forgave Millet and is quoted as saying, "I could stamp on his face and grind it into the gravel until it bled."