Statue Timeline for the Statue of Liberty, and the related contemporary events that were happening around the same time.
1865:
At dinner party, Edouard Laboulaye, chairman of French anti-slavery society, proposes monument to liberty and U.S. independence in centennial year
(1876); sculptor Frederic Auguste Bartholdi attends.
U.S. Civil War ends, President Abraham Lincoln assassinated; Lewis.
Carroll publishes "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland"; trans-Atlantic
cable completed. 1867: Bartholdi proposes huge statue of robed woman holding torch ("Egypt Bringing the Light to Asia") for opening of Suez Canal (1869); idea unsuccessful.
Russia sells Alaska to United States; Karl Marx, "Das Kapital, Part I"; Johann Strauss composes "The Blue Danube"; chemist Marie Curie born.
1870:
Bartholdi begins designing sketchy figures of "Liberty" monument
Franco-Prussian War begins; V.I. Lenin born; Charles Dickens dies; Jules Verne, "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea"; Napoleon III surrenders.
1871:
Bartholdi seeks Laboulaye's aid in trip to United States, arrives in New York (June); tours country promoting idea of Franco-American monument on Bedloe's Island in New York Harbor.
Peace of Frankfurt ends Franco-Prussian War; George Elliot,.
"Middlemarch"; Albert Hall opens in London; P. T. Barnum's "Greatest.
Show on Earth" circus opens in New York.
1872:
Bartholdi returns to France
U.S. Grant reelected President; James Whistler paints "Whistler's Mother"; civil war in Spain.
1875:
Franco-American Union created in France, committee approves Bartholdi's plaster model of "Liberty Enlightening the World," begins fundraising 600,000 francs; Laboulaye presents formal request to.
President U.S. Grant through Ambassador Levi P. Morton to use Bedloe's Island site for monument.
Albert Schweitzer born; Mark Twain, "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"; Georges Bizet composes "Carmen"; Hans Christian Andersen dies; Britain buys majority of Suez Canal; Captain Matthew Webb first to swim across English Channel.
1876:
Bartholdi begins constructing statue, completes hand and torch, sent to U.S. for display at Centennial Exposition in Philadelphia (August 14); Bartholdi returns to U.S. May 6; hand and torch shipped to.
New York, displayed at Madison Square.
Disputed Tilden-Hayes presidential contest in U.S.; Korea becomes independent nation; writer Jack London born; writer George Sand dies; Alexander Graham Bell invents the telephone; U.S. Centennial exposition held in Philadelphia.
1877:
Outgoing President Grant signs bill designating Bedloe's Island for proposed monument (March), U.S. fundraising of $250,000 begins; Tuileries diorama unveiled; Grant visits Paris (November); statue construction continues, French fundraising continues.
Rutherford Hayes becomes U.S. president; Queen Victoria proclaimed Empress of India; Henry James, "The American"; Thomas Edison invents the phonograph; first public telephones in use in U.S.; Russia declares war on Turkey.
1878:
Statue's head and shoulders completed, displayed for first time at Paris Universal Exposition; French fundraising continues.
Treaty of Berlin; Thomas Hardy, "The Return of the Native"; Gilbert and Sullivan compose "H.M.S. Pinafore"; Salvation Army takes current name.
1879:
Statue engineer Viollet-le-Duc dies, replaced by Alexander Gustav Eiffel; French fundraising continues.
French Panama Canal Company chartered; Joseph Stalin born; Albert Einstein born; Henrik Ibsen, "A Doll's House."
1880:
Eiffel designs innovative 98-foot, 120-ton inner framework to support statue; French committee completes fundraising, U.S. fundraising continues.
James A. Garfield elected U.S. president; Lew Wallace, "Ben Hur"; educator Helen Keller born; Auguste Rodin completes "The Thinker"; Thomas Edison invents the light bulb.
1881:
Statue's copper plates completed, first rivet driven by Ambassador Morton at construction site (October 24) ; U.S. fundraising continues.
U.S. President Garfield assassinated; Fyodor Dostoevsky dies; Pablo Picasso born; Tuskegee Institute founded in Alabama.
1882:
Edouard Laboulaye dies; Ferdinand de Lesseps chairs the Union; French poet Victor Hugo visits the statue, praises its "idea"; statue's arm and torch returned from New York; U.S. fundraising languishes.
Triple Alliance formed (Austria, Germany, and Italy); Robert Louis Stevenson, "Treasure Island"; Charles Darwin dies; Franklin Delano Roosevelt born; Peter Tchaikovsky composes "1812 Overture."
1883:
Statue's assembly continues in Paris; work begins on foundation of pedestal on Bedloe's Island, designed by R. M. Hunt and supervised by General Charles Pomeroy Stone; Joseph Pulitzer purchases New York World newspaper.
Reform begins of U.S. civil service; Benito Mussolini born; Franz Kafka born; Karl Marx dies; Richard Wagner dies; first skyscraper built in Chicago (10 stories); Brooklyn Bridge opens to traffic in New York.
1884:
Statue completed, formally handed over to U.S. ownership in Paris, accepted by Ambassador Morton; (July 4); first stone laid for pedestal on Bedloe's Island; U.S. fundraising languishes; New York governor.
Grover Cleveland vetoes $50,000 state appropriation.
Grover Cleveland elected U.S. president; Mark Twain, "Huckleberry Finn"; Oxford English dictionary begins publication; Harry Truman born; first deep tube (underground railroad), London; Sir Charles Parsons invents first practical steam turbine engine.
1885:
Statue disassembled, crated for shipment to U.S.; Joseph Pulitzer undertakes spectacular new push for U.S. fundraising, generates $50,000 in two months;
statue crosses the Atlantic in crates, nearly sinks in storm, arrives at Bedloe's Island (June17); Bartholdi arrives in U.S. (November).
Former president Ulysses S. Grant dies; Victor Hugo dies; Gilbert and Sullivan compose "The Mikado"; Louis Pasteur devises anti-rabies vaccine; D. H. Lawrence born; Sinclair Lewis born; George Eastman
manufactures coated photographic paper; golf introduced to America.
1886:
Pedestal completed; Eiffel's "skeleton" raised; decision is made to light the torch electrically; Statue of Liberty assembled; formal unveiling by Bartholdi at dedication ceremony held on Bedloe's Island (October 28), with President Grover Cleveland presiding.
Auguste Rodin completes "The Kiss"; Henry James, "The Bostonians"; hydroelectric installations begun at Niagara Falls; Canadian Pacific Railway completed; Bonaparte and Orleans families banished from France.
1903:
Words from Emma Lazarus’ poem "The New Colossus" are added to the base of the statue
Thank you PBS, Credit goes to you here :)
