Medal

  • Category:

    Metals

  • Creator (Role):

    Hermon Atkins MacNeil (Designer and maker)

    Gorham Manufacturing Co. (Maker)

  • Place of Origin:

    Providence, Rhode Island, United States, North America

  • Date:

    1901-1901

  • Materials:

    Bronze

  • Museum Object Number:

    2017.0043.027.002


  • Complete Details



Object Number

2017.0043.027.002

Object Name

Medal

Category

Metals

Credit Line/Donor

American Textile History Museum

Creator (Role)

Hermon Atkins MacNeil (Designer and maker)
1866-1947

Gorham Manufacturing Co. (Maker)
The Gorham Manufacturing Corporation had several different names during its history.

Place of Origin

Providence, Rhode Island, United States, North America

Date

1901-1901

Mark or Signature or Inscription or Label

1. Mark; Edge; "GORHAM CO" stamped incuse
2. Mark; Edge; "BRONZE" stamped incuse
3. Inscription; Obverse, legend; "PAN - AMERICAN E[XP]OSITION" in low relief
4. Mark; Obverse, exergue; "HERMON MACNEIL SC" appeas in small letters in low relief
5. Mark; Reverse, on South America; "ERMON MACNEIL" in small letters

Subjects

world's fair; Textiles; Native American

Materials

Bronze

Dimensions (inches)

0.13 (H) , 2.5 (Diam)

Dimensions (centimeters)

0.33 (H) , 6.35 (Diam)

Object Description

Web - 12/07/2017

This commemorative medal is one of multiples created as premium awards for leading participants in the Pan-American Exposition held in Buffalo, New York. The designer, a towering figure in American Beaux-Arts sculpture, concentrated his symbolic, monumental imagery to honor the fair's goals and to celebrate American, rather than European, artistic heritage. The obverse features a dynamic nude figure of an allegorical woman (Liberty?) holding a winged globe aloft and striding beside a powerful male bison (for Buffalo). The reverse illustrates the Exposition's celebration of peaceful exchange with symbolic male figures representing the two continents depicted as maps on their spheres. They face each other and clasp opposite ends of feather-adorned peace pipe between them. The man wearing South or Central American regalia is seated cross-legged and the seated man representing North America has a full feather headdress and buckskin clothes with one foot resting on a sheath of arrows.