Gloucester

Joan of Arc by Anna Hyatt Huntington, 1921
Artist Anna Hyatt Huntington worked in Gloucester, as have many artists for a long time. This sculpture honors the town’s citizens who died in World War I. Its size and location make it hard to miss in Gloucester, but its history was lost over the years.

In 2000, local Girl Scouts began a campaign to raise awareness of its meaning. They wrote about it in the local paper, contacted surviving family members of those memorialized, and searched correspondence and news articles in the town archives and library. They created an album about the monument, with a page for each citizen who died during the war. The album is now in the archives.

In 2001, Joan of Arc was professionally cleaned, or conserved. Compare the two photographs. One was taken before conservation and one after. What differences can you see between the two pictures?