The equestrian memorial to Theodore Roosevelt has long prompted objections as a symbol of colonialism and racism.

The statue of Theodore Roosevelt outside the Museum of Natural History, under police watch, will be coming down. It has drawn many protests in recent years.

The statue of Theodore Roosevelt outside the Museum of Natural History, under police watch, will be coming down. It has drawn many protests in recent years.Credit...Caitlin Ochs for The New York Times

Robin Pogrebin

By Robin Pogrebin

June 21, 2020

Updated 7:28 p.m. ET

The bronze statue of Theodore Roosevelt, on horseback and flanked by a Native American man and an African man, which has presided over the entrance to the American Museum of Natural History in New York since 1940, is coming down.

The decision, proposed by the museum and agreed to by New York City, which owns the building and property, came after years of objections from activists and at a time when the killing of George Floyd has initiated an urgent nationwide conversation about racism.

For many, the “Equestrian” statue at the museum’s Central Park West entrance had come to symbolize a painful legacy of colonial expansion and racial discrimination.

“Over the last few weeks, our museum community has been profoundly moved by the ever-widening movement for racial justice that has emerged after the killing of George Floyd,” the museum’s president, Ellen V. Futter, said in an interview. “We have watched as the attention of the world and the country has increasingly turned to statues as powerful and hurtful symbols of systemic racism.

“Simply put,” she added, “the time has come to move it.”

The museum took action amid a heated national debate over the appropriateness of statues or monuments that first focused on Confederate symbols like Robert E. Lee and has now moved on to a wider arc of figures, from Christopher Columbus to Thomas Jefferson.

Last week alone, a crowd set fire to a statue of George Washington in Portland, Ore., before pulling it to the ground. Gunfire broke out during a protest in Albuquerque to demand the removal of a statue of Juan de Oñate, the despotic conquistador of New Mexico. And New York City Council members demanded that a statue of Thomas Jefferson be removed from City Hall.

In many of those cases, the calls for removal were made by protesters who say the images are too offensive to stand as monuments to American history. The decision about the Roosevelt statue is different, made by a museum that, like others, had previously defended — and preserved — such portraits as relics of their time and that however objectionable, could perhaps serve to educate. It was then seconded by the city, which had the final say.

“The American Museum of Natural History has asked to remove the Theodore Roosevelt statue because it explicitly depicts Black and Indigenous people as subjugated and racially inferior,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said in a statement. “The City supports the Museum’s request. It is the right decision and the right time to remove this problematic statue.”

When the monument will be taken down, where it will go and what, if anything, will replace it, remain undetermined, officials said.

A Roosevelt family member, who is a trustee of the museum, released a statement approving of the removal.

“The world does not need statues, relics of another age, that reflect neither the values of the person they intend to honor nor the values of equality and justice,” said Theodore Roosevelt IV, a great-grandson of the 26th president and a member of the museum’s board of trustees. “The composition of the Equestrian Statue does not reflect Theodore Roosevelt’s legacy. It is time to move the statue and move forward.”

Image“The world does not need statues, relics of another age, that reflect neither the values of the person they intend to honor nor the values of equality and justice,” said Theodore Roosevelt IV, a great-grandson of the 26th president, said in a statement approving the removal.

“The world does not need statues, relics of another age, that reflect neither the values of the person they intend to honor nor the values of equality and justice,” said Theodore Roosevelt IV, a great-grandson of the 26th president, said in a statement approving the removal.Credit...Caitlin Ochs for The New York Times

To be sure, the Roosevelt family did get something in return; the museum is naming its Hall of Biodiversity for Roosevelt “in recognition of his conservation legacy,” Ms. Futter said.

Ms. Futter also made a point of saying that the museum was only taking issue with the statue itself, not with Roosevelt overall, with whom the institution has a long history.

His father was a founding member of the institution; its charter was signed in his home. Roosevelt’s childhood excavations were among the museum’s first artifacts. The museum was chosen by New York’s state legislature for Roosevelt’s memorial in 1920.

The museum already has several spaces named after Roosevelt, including Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Hall, the Theodore Roosevelt Rotunda and Theodore Roosevelt Park outside.

“It’s very important to note that our request is based on the statue, that is the hierarchical composition that’s depicted in it,” Ms. Futter said. “It is not about Theodore Roosevelt who served as Governor of New York before becoming the 26th president of the United States and was a pioneering conservationist.”

Critics, though, have pointed to President Roosevelt’s opinions about racial hierarchy and eugenics and his pivotal role in the Spanish-American War.

The statue — created by James Earle Fraser — was one of four memorials in New York that a city commission reconsidered in 2017, ultimately deciding after a split decision to leave the statue in place and to add context.

The museum tried to add that context with an exhibition last year, “Addressing the Statue,” which explored its design and installation, the inclusion of the figures walking beside Roosevelt and Roosevelt’s racism. The museum also examined its own potential complicity, in particular its exhibitions on eugenics in the early 20th century.

The exhibition was partly a response to the defacing of the statue by protesters, who in 2017 splashed red liquid representing blood over the statue’s base. The protesters, who identified themselves as members of the Monument Removal Brigade, later published a statement on the internet calling for its removal as an emblem of “patriarchy, white supremacy and settler-colonialism.”

“Now the statue is bleeding,” the statement said. “We did not make it bleed. It is bloody at its very foundation.”

The group also said the museum should “rethink its cultural halls regarding the colonial mentality behind them.”

At the time, the museum said complaints should be channeled through Mayor de Blasio’s commission to review city monuments and that the museum was planning to update its exhibits. The institution has since undertaken a renovation of its North West Coast Hall in consultation with native nations from the North West Coast of Canada and Alaska.

In January, the museum also moved the Northwest Coast Great Canoe from its 77th Street entrance into that hall, to better contextualize it. The museum’s Old New York diorama, which includes a stereotypical depiction of Lenape leaders, now has captions explaining why the display is offensive.

Mayor de Blasio has made a point of rethinking public monuments to honor more women and people of color — an undertaking led largely by his wife, Chirlane McCray, and the She Built NYC commission. But these efforts have also been controversial, given complaints about the transparency of the process and the public figures who have been excluded, namely Mother Cabrini, a patron saint of immigrants who had drawn the most nominations in a survey of New Yorkers.

On Friday, the Mayor announced that Ms. McCray would lead a Racial Justice and Reconciliation Commission whose brief would include reviewing the city’s potentially racist monuments.

Though the debates over many of these statues have been marked by rancor, the Natural History Museum seems unconflicted about removing the Roosevelt monument that has greeted its visitors for so long.

“We believe that moving the statue can be a symbol of progress in our commitment to build and sustain an inclusive and equitable society,” Ms. Futter said. “Our view has been evolving. This moment crystallized our thinking and galvanized us to action.”

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(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468506)

*two weeks elapses*

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468694)

"I CAN LIVE WITH THIS... but RAISING THE CAPITAL GAINS TAX would be a BRIDGE too FAR! There I must draw the LINE!"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468011)

"To be sure, the Roosevelt family did get something in return; the museum is naming its Hall of Biodiversity for Roosevelt “in recognition of his conservation legacy,” Ms. Futter said."

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468020)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodore_Roosevelt#The_Progressive_("Bull_Moose")_Party

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468047)

a) gay

b) married to a minority

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468111)

also xo: "men in relationships with minorities suck"

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469871)

The New York museum caves to woke critics of its Theodore Roosevelt statue under the guise of providing ‘context.’

By Edward Rothstein

July 31, 2019 6:11 pm ET

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New York

It is not the kind of statue that would be erected today. It is so monumental it can be only partially taken in, even from across the width of Central Park West. First unveiled in 1940, it was conceived of as emerging from John Russell Pope’s equally monumental 1936 building, now the main entrance to the American Museum of Natural History. A 126-foot-long frieze borders the statue’s plaza, in which are chiseled such words as SOLDIER, STATESMAN, HISTORIAN, EXPLORER, CONSERVATIONIST and NATURALIST.

James Earle Fraser’s 1940 statue depicts Roosevelt on horseback flanked by an American Indian and an African tribesman.

PHOTO: DENIS FINNIN/AMERICAN MUSEUM OF NATURAL HISTORY

The statue, created by James Earle Fraser, displays the object of this encomium, Theodore Roosevelt, erect on horseback, stern and triumphant, gazing outward. Flanking his horse, on foot, are an American Indian and an African tribesman. They wear loosely draped traditional clothing; the first figure is of an indeterminate Plains tribe, the latter can be vaguely associated with the Maasai people of East Africa. They stand considerably lower than Roosevelt’s mounted figure.

Is there any doubt about what happens once woke standards are applied to this grouping? It has been the focus of multiple protests in recent years, many of whose objections and charges recur in “Addressing the Statue,” a small exhibition inside the museum about the controversies. The statue is “a monument to white supremacy,” declares one scholar. It is about “taming the savage,” says another. And Roosevelt himself? “Absolutely” a racist.

Addressing the Statue

American Museum of Natural History

Such assessments are accompanied by man-and-woman-on-the-street interviews in an introductory video. Some reactions? There should be a dinosaur instead. Or the figures should all be at the same height so they are “equal.” A timeline gives us information about Roosevelt, emphasizing shortcomings in his racial perceptions while citing his progressive and conservationist creds.

The exhibition is in response to the January 2018 report by the Mayoral Advisory Commission on City Art, Monuments and Markers about controversies inspired by New York statues. According to the report, no conclusion was reached about this one. About half the commission thought additional historical research was needed, about half advocated removing the statue, and a few advocated keeping it while providing context. The museum seems to be hoping the third approach, as executed, will suffice.

But the exhibition actually does very little to help explain the statue or to put it in context. And while it claims to want to participate in a “national conversation” by presenting a variety of views, its own weigh down the scales. In “support” of the statue it cites the architect Pope’s assertion that it portrays a “heroic group,” and it offers some defense of Roosevelt from the scholar Douglas Brinkley (“He was closer to the ideal we have today of integration and equality than the other political characters of the era”). But just as the Mayoral Commission began with premises about our nation’s “challenging legacy of racism, colonialism, ableism, sexism, prejudice, and inequality” and the need for an “intersectional” approach to the city’s art, so too does the museum begin by asserting that the statue portrays a “racial hierarchy” that it has “long found disturbing.” Its timeline also cites Roosevelt’s “disturbing views” in an 1886 lecture in which he said: “I don’t go so far as to think that the only good Indian is the dead Indian, but I believe nine out of every ten are, and I shouldn’t like to inquire too closely into the case of the tenth.”

But that sentiment, now widely cited, was expressed by a man in his late 20s and is not, as far as I can tell, echoed in Roosevelt’s actions or his published works. His attitudes, at any rate, became far more complex.

As for the statue, only one commentator in the exhibition, Harriet F. Senie, who teaches Art Museum Studies at the City College of New York, challenges the overall caricature by noting that the two accompanying figures in the statue are allegorical representations of two continents (as a member of the Mayoral Commission, she must have been a lonely voice). Her assertion is supported by the fact that the plaza’s frieze includes bas-relief sculptures showing 18 animal species from those same two continents. The allegorical interpretation is also reflected in the figures’ appearance. Neither the American Indian nor the African are subservient. They are gun-bearers and guides. And their faces show absolutely no evidence of racial condescension by the sculptor. They are proud, even fierce. They stride without deference.

That allegorical element is amplified in the building’s rotunda, which contains three murals by William Andrew Mackay covering more than 5,200 square feet. They are partly narrative, partly fantasy, partly allegory. They glorify Roosevelt by showing the immense spheres of his action. He is bringing something remarkable to his encounters on nearly every continent. He reviews plans for the Panama Canal, stands regnant over African creatures he will bring back from his 1910 expedition (it took the Smithsonian eight years to catalog them), and brings peace to great warring peoples in Japan and Russia (and thus wins the Nobel Prize). And yes, there are themes that would also animate today’s critics. A Kiplingesque homage is being paid to the imperial benefactor, who moves among natives of all continents. There is also a racialist overtone in the African mural with its image of Noah’s condemned son Ham as the continent’s progenitor.

For at least some of the glory, there is good reason. The problem is that for a generation or more, our culture has been preoccupied with a particular theme: If hierarchy of any kind exists, it must be a sign of inequity and also of racism. And that assessment eclipses all others. If that happens in this case we will never understand these murals, the statue, Roosevelt, or, in fact, the museum itself.

It would be in the interest of the museum to aggressively challenge this approach to culture. It apparently refuses. But what, after all, led to the founding of natural history museums in the first place? They were Rooseveltian celebrations—mythic temples portraying the realms from which Western Civilization arose. The natural world with its minerals and fossils and fish became closely associated with artifacts from cultures also deemed closer to nature. Right now we might characterize that approach as racist or ignorant—but only in part. There is still something to be learned from it. And think, too, of the deeper impulse here: These museums reflected a civilization’s unbounded curiosity about the principles governing other cultures and the natural world. No similar impulse can be found in any other culture of the time; it is far more rare than racism which, in varied forms, is pretty much universal. That past does not need to be jettisoned; it needs to be understood along with its astonishing achievements.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468055)

lol of course the lib narrative about the statue is a FRAUD

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468076)

ideally, these blue cities will continue do this stuff, let them serve as an object example, frightening people in red states/suburbs out of complacence. let the antagonism between the blue/red become as stark as possible.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468107)

these people need to be rounded up and put in camps

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468217)

https://twitter.com/owenbroadcast/status/1274829020035768322

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468315)

Russia singlehandedly killed Western Civ with that move

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468553)

Anna Bevens Face with medical mask

@AHansonBevens

Replying to

@Matthew_Xing

At first, I was “What? No! Why!”

But reading the article, it makes it clear: “Ms. Futter [the museum’s president] also made a point of saying that the museum was only taking issue with the statue itself, not with Roosevelt overall, with whom the institution has a long history.”

2:55 PM · Jun 21, 2020·Twitter for iPhone

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(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468383)

The Purple Pie Pal Globe with meridians

@ThePurplePiePal

·

1h

Yeah as a country becomes plurality non-white, celebrating people that were proto white supremacist or slave owners becomes more intolerable. There is nothing that can stop that. A person doesn't want to be told someone is a hero, when they would have ordid crush their ancestors.

48

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(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468397)

Mathieu

@TheAmazingBriz

·

1h

Replying to

@ThePurplePiePal

@AF632

and

@nytimes

The concept of preserving history is white supremacy. POC come from a tradition of oral story telling. I think it would be nice if we move to a system where we don't retain any knowledge, because knowledge & anything that tracks in an ability to read is racist.

8

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(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468399)

https://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/addressing-the-theodore-roosevelt-statue

https://www.amnh.org/exhibitions/addressing-the-theodore-roosevelt-statue/perspectives-today

Glad we are now more enlightened today then we were in 2019

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468578)

"In a tweet three days later, an activist group, Decolonize This Place, suggested that if Mayor de Blasio did not remove the monument, it would be forcibly taken down."

https://www.ny1.com/nyc/all-boroughs/news/2020/06/21/roosevelt-statue-will-be-removed-from-museum-of-natural-history

They are pushing to remove other statues in NYC, too

https://www.westsiderag.com/2020/06/17/police-fence-off-more-monuments-as-daniel-webster-statue-is-vandalized

The same group caused $100K in damages when they vandalized the NYC subway during a violent protest in January

https://abc7ny.com/decolonize-this-place-nyc-mta-protest/5909640/

They also organized the antifa riots in NYC after George Floyd's death

https://nypost.com/2020/06/05/nypd-commissioner-says-violent-nyc-protest-was-only-about-mayhem/

The group was founded by two foreign-born "art" professors (art professors destroying art)

https://www.thecollegefix.com/professor-who-urged-followers-to-f-sh-up-on-nyc-subway-is-victim-of-counterinsurgency-allies-say/

Their twitter feed is absolute insanity:

https://twitter.com/decolonize_this

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468665)

https://twitter.com/TeenVogue/status/1274548191447433216

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469443)

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/11/museum-natural-history-theodore-roosevelt-statue-protest

At the end of the tour in the hall, activists began chanting, “Respect! Remove! Rename!” before swarming around the large dinosaur skeletons in the lobby with signs that read, “DECOLONIZE THIS MUSEUM”, “ABOLISH WHITE SUPREMACY” and “BLACK LIVES MATTER”.

“Teddy Roosevelt’s nature was not empty wilderness. It was and is indigenous land,” one reader said as the organizers took turns reading from a speech. “Taken through violence. Just like Columbus who came to enslave. To take their gold and their bodies and their souls.”

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469914)

https://decolonizethisplace.org

https://twitter.com/decolonize_this

https://www.instagram.com/decolonizethisplace/?hl=en

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469922)

I say 20 years tops and probably closer to 10

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40468835)

That Roosevelt statue is something every new yorker has seen a 100 times. It means something to people. This will be remembered, for better or worse.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469432)

https://i.imgur.com/LtKaf48.jpg

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469738)

He was also a close friend of US President Theodore Roosevelt, and served as best man at his second wedding.[1]

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4566683&forum_id=2#40469875)