Holiday Open House

A monument decided by public vote

The statue began with Ernest Whitworth Marland, an oilman, philanthropist, U.S. congressman and later Oklahoma governor, who conceived and funded the project. In 1926, he invited sculptors to submit small models. Four months later, the designs were shown around the country, and 750,000 people voted. Bryant Baker’s proposal won by a wide margin.

Baker was born in London in 1881, trained at the Royal Academy of Arts there and moved to the United States in 1916. His bronze Pioneer Woman stands 17 feet tall and weighs 12,000 pounds. The monument cost $300,000.

The statue was unveiled on April 22, 1930, the anniversary of Oklahoma’s first land run, before a crowd of 40,000. President Herbert Hoover and Oklahoma native Patrick J. Hurley, then secretary of war, each gave a brief radio address from Washington, D.C.; Will Rogers spoke at the ceremony. The museum east of the statue was dedicated in 1958, and the monument entered the National Register of Historic Places in 1978.

Further reading: Pioneer Woman Museum and Statue | Oklahoma Historical Society ↗

More than the monument

The museum’s mission includes preserving the stories of women of varied racial, religious and national backgrounds who contributed to Oklahoma’s development. That broader purpose places the statue within a larger account of women’s roles in the state, rather than making the monument the museum’s only subject.

The Oklahoma Historical Society describes the education center as featuring craft demonstrations, special exhibits, an interactive timeline and a Pioneer Woman Walk of Fame. Those are features of the museum; the open-house listing does not identify them as special timed activities for Dec. 5.

Further reading: Pioneer Woman Museum and Statue | Oklahoma Historical Society ↗