By COLE REIF
Great Bend Post
In 1951, the Boy Scouts Troop 147 in La Crosse was instrumental in the construction of a smaller replica of the Statue of Liberty in New York.
As part of the Boy Scouts of America’s 40th anniversary in 1950, a campaign started to position the statue replicas across the United States. Approximately 200 Statue of Liberty replicas were installed in the country as part of the “Strengthen the Arm of Liberty” campaign, with 26 of them located in Kansas.
Mike Pivonka was a member of the Boy Scouts troop in La Crosse in the 1950s that helped raise the money for the statue located in City Park, along Main Street.
"The scout troop here collected newspapers, cardboard, any kind of paper products that we could ship to Hutchinson and get a little money for," said Pivonka. "We used an empty garage to tie these things all up until we had a truckload. The American Legion and VFW kicked in some money. Finally, it accumulated enough money to get the statue bought."
Statues were sold for $300 - $350 in the 1950s.
The roughly 8' tall statue rests on a large stone base. The base was in bad shape and starting to fall apart. La Crosse City Manager Duane Moeder asked Pivonka this year about repairing the base.
"We were able to find a brick layer that would work on it, but then we couldn't find any brick that matched the original," said Pivonka. "Duane found some material very similar to the buildings in the park. They were made out of post rock limestone."
A brick layer then duplicated what was originally constructed, a seven-point star base, a replica of the statue in New York.
Before placing the statue back, Pivonka took the creation to his shop at Flame Engineering in La Crosse where he soldered cracks and holes.
"There were over 30 places in the statue that needed repair," said Pivonka. "I'm an old farm boy and learned how to solder many years ago from my dad. It was pretty slow going. You had to be careful not to destroy any of the features originally there."
The restoration was finished in August.
Pivonka said there was close to $16,000 raised for the renovation of the statue. Community members and scouts from the original Troop 147 contributed to the project.
"I started searching out old scouts that were in that troop," said Pivonka. "It took some time to reach all of them. They were all very gracious and helped us out considerably."
The Golden Belt Community Foundation also awarded the City of La Crosse a $2,000 grant for the repairs. Pivonka and city officials are still raising funds to pay for the restoration.
You can direct any donations to the La Crosse City Office at 1119 Main Street.