Temperance Union Lion Statue - lil' Las Vegas, New Mexico by parachutefactory

Last crawled date: 3 years, 1 month ago

From "Save the LION" - a local Facebook group in the original Las Vegas, NEW MEXICO:
"Fountain Park” (The Triangle, Lion Park) started as an open patch of ground where wagons parked. In 1896, the Women's Christian Temperance Union employed a local stonemason, Angelo de Tullio, to design and sculpt a fountain. They hoped to offer an alternative watering hole to the neighboring saloons. De Tullio’s fountain is dominated by an angelic-looking lion. This stiffly-rendered piece of folk sculpture spurted water from its mouth into a trough below. The fountain represents one work of the local community of immigrant Italian stonemasons, and as Lynn Perrigo has suggested: "is emblematic of the past interplay of two facets of local culture -- the excesses of the boom era and the determination of dedicated local women to create a wholesome environment in Las Vegas."
From Architecture & Preservation in Las Vegas by Chris Wilson:
The Lion Fountain consists of a base, pedestal, basin, plinth block, and lion sculpture all carved from local reddish-brown sandstone typically referred to as “Romeroville Stone”. It suffers from ‘spalling’ the delamination of the stone from freezing and thawing during the seasons. The upper lip, right paw and tail are in need of repair and graffiti needs to be cleaned. The fountain pipes are all intact and could possibly be restored to a water fountain.