Sam Houston was a politician who played a significant role in Texas state history. Huntsville, Texas has a 67-foot statue of him, called “A Tribute to Courage”, which is claimed to be the tallest statue of an American figure in the world. The statue was built by David Adickes, who based it on a life-size plaster cast of Houston and took three years to complete.
Sam Houston was a politician in Texas in the 19th century who presided over the creation of the Republic of Texas, until it became part of the United States. The city of Huntsville, Texas boasts a statue of Sam Houston that the city government claims is the tallest statue of an American in the world. Produced by a local sculptor, David Adickes, the statue was erected in 1994.
Sam Houston’s life is part of Texas state history. When he was 16, he ran away from his family in Virginia to live with the Cherokees in Tennessee. He enlisted in the army in 1813, but then changed careers to become a lawyer in 1818. Politics became an interest a year later, and after a stint as governor of Tennessee, he played an important role in Texas politics. Sam Houston led the Texian Army against the Mexican Army after the Alamo and drove them back into Mexico.
Since Sam Houston was the president of the new republic of Texas and the governor of the region after it became a state, several monuments and museums exist in his honor in the state. In addition to the Sam Houston statue, a bronze representation of the man on horseback is featured in Hermann Park in the city of Houston. A museum dedicated to his exploits is located in Huntsville, where he made his home for much of his later years.
Huntsville is also the site for the Sam Houston statue. A whopping 67 feet (about 20m) tall, the statue is made of concrete and steel. It shows the man standing with a walking stick and looking proudly at the Texan landscape. Officially, the statue is called “A Tribute to Courage”, but informally it is also called “Big Sam”. Although the tallest statue in the country, as of 2011, is the Statue of Liberty in New York, the city of Huntsville claims the Sam Houston statue is the tallest statue of a heroic American figure in the world.
When David Adickes built the Sam Houston statue, he based it on a life-size plaster cast of the historical figure. It took the sculptor the next three years to build the statue and even found his own funding for the materials and cost of the work. Once the statue was raised, on a granite base that was itself 10 feet (about 3 m) high, the statue could be seen from more than six miles (nearly 10 km) away.
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