Corn Husker Statue Heading To Smithsonian
Although hand corn huskers move down the field with all the grace and rhythm of a trained athlete, those who still practice the disappearing skill don't usually attract much attention. Soon, however, visitors to the nation's capital will be able to see a corn husker captured in bronze, celebrating the art and skill of this manual labor turned sport.
The four-foot high, 300 pound, bronze cast of a young man husking corn in a 1941competition will be on exhibit at the Smithsonian's American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. The statue captures and holds for all time the movement and dogged determination that once stripped the nation's fields of its golden ears of corn.
True corn huskers are few and far between today. However, 141 of them did compete in the 2001 National Hand Corn Husking Contest held near Redwood Falls, Minn. Contestants came from nine states, and the competition included categories for youth, a women's open class, and one for those over 75 years of age.
Hand corn husking contests provided great entertainment throughout the Corn Belt in the Depression years. Contestants were judged not only by the amount of corn picked, but also by how clean it was. Deductions were levied for husks and missed ears.
The model for the corn husker sculpture was an Iowa champion corn husker named Marion Link. Link was competing in a contest near Nevada, Iowa attended by Christian Peterson, then Iowa State University (ISU) artist in residence. Peterson sketched the muscular farmer as he moved smoothly down the field. That night he made his first copy in clay. Later, he asked Link to pose for the final sculpture. The shy young man did so only after getting Peterson to agree to change the face so he wouldn't be recognized.
The National Art Museum, which is currently undergoing extensive remodeling, recently acquired the statue, which sat in storage in an Iowa hotel for the past 18 years. When the museum reopens, more than one million people a year will see it.
Contact FARM SHOW Followup: Judy Lambert, President, National Cornhuskers Association, 6691 N 300 E, Urbana, Ill. 46990 (ph 219 774-8322).
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Corn Husker Statue Heading To Smithsonian AG WORLD 26-5-24 Although hand corn huskers move down the field with all the grace and rhythm of a trained athlete, those who still practice the disappearing skill don't usually attract much attention. Soon, however, visitors to the nation's capital will be able to see a corn husker captured in bronze, celebrating the art and skill of this manual labor turned sport.
The four-foot high, 300 pound, bronze cast of a young man husking corn in a 1941competition will be on exhibit at the Smithsonian's American Art Museum in Washington, D.C. The statue captures and holds for all time the movement and dogged determination that once stripped the nation's fields of its golden ears of corn.
True corn huskers are few and far between today. However, 141 of them did compete in the 2001 National Hand Corn Husking Contest held near Redwood Falls, Minn. Contestants came from nine states, and the competition included categories for youth, a women's open class, and one for those over 75 years of age.
Hand corn husking contests provided great entertainment throughout the Corn Belt in the Depression years. Contestants were judged not only by the amount of corn picked, but also by how clean it was. Deductions were levied for husks and missed ears.
The model for the corn husker sculpture was an Iowa champion corn husker named Marion Link. Link was competing in a contest near Nevada, Iowa attended by Christian Peterson, then Iowa State University (ISU) artist in residence. Peterson sketched the muscular farmer as he moved smoothly down the field. That night he made his first copy in clay. Later, he asked Link to pose for the final sculpture. The shy young man did so only after getting Peterson to agree to change the face so he wouldn't be recognized.
The National Art Museum, which is currently undergoing extensive remodeling, recently acquired the statue, which sat in storage in an Iowa hotel for the past 18 years. When the museum reopens, more than one million people a year will see it.
Contact FARM SHOW Followup: Judy Lambert, President, National Cornhuskers Association, 6691 N 300 E, Urbana, Ill. 46990 (ph 219 774-8322).
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