Kneeling Woman, (sculpture).

Kneeling Woman, (sculpture).

Stackpole, Ralph, 1885-1973, sculptor.

Kneeling Woman, (sculpture).

Commissioned 1938. Presented July 15, 1943.

Digital Reference:

Sculpture: travertine stone; Foundation: concrete.

Approx. 51 x 21 x 40 in.(2 1/2 tons).

A large block of stone carved into a figure of a kneeling young woman with her head bent and her hands clasped on her lap.

Figure female -- Full length

Figure female -- Nude

Outdoor Sculpture -- New York -- Hyde Park

Administered by National Archives and Records Administration, 7th & Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, District of Columbia

Located Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum, 259 Albany Post Road, Hyde Park, New York 12538

In 1915, as Assistant Secretary to the Navy, a young Franklin Roosevelt visited the Panama-Pacific Exposition in San Francisco where he saw a beautiful sculpture by Ralph Stackhouse title "Worship." The sculpture was a delicate depiction of a nude young woman, kneeling with her head bowed. It struck a cord in Roosevelt and he always remembered it. In 1938, he initiated efforts to get a copy of the sculpture for his cottage in Hyde Park. Two of his California friends, George and Carmen Baker, got in touch with the artist, who agreed to create a new one, since the original was no longer in his collection.

It took him five years to finish the sculpture and when it was presented to Roosevelt, the artist admitted that his style had changed such that making an exact copy of the original was not attractive to him. The sculpture he created was thus heavily influenced by the artist's twenty-eight years of artistic experience gained in the intervening years. However, Roosevelt preferred the original, and at the suggestion of his press secretary, William D. Hassett, the sculpture was placed in a remote part of the grounds where it was screened by evergreens. It was discovered there in 1987 during construction of a new parking lot. On April 30, 1987, it was moved back a bit and another circle of evergreens was planted around it.

IAS files contain a newspaper article from the New York Times, July 31, 1987; and excerpts from Jonathan Daniels, "Washington Quadrille, The Dance beside the Documents," New York: Doubleday, 1968, pg. 273-274; and William Hassett's "Off the Record with FDR," pg. 30-31.

Index of American Sculpture, University of Delaware, 1985

Franklin D. Roosevelt Library and Museum, 1989.

Save Outdoor Sculpture, New York survey, 1994.

New York Times, July, 21, 1987.

The information provided about this artwork was compiled as part of the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Inventories of American Painting and Sculpture database, designed to provide descriptive and location information on artworks by American artists in public and private collections worldwide.

Inventories of American Painting and Sculpture, Smithsonian American Art Museum, P.O. Box 37012, MRC 970, Washington, D.C. 20013-7012

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