(DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA) Washington National Monument broadsid

Sale 2580 - Lot 127

Price Realized: $ 2,250

?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price

Estimate: $ 500 - $ 750

(DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.) Washington National Monument broadside. Illustrated broadside, 12 x 7 1/2 inches; moderate wear including two closed tears, 1 and 2 inches, laid down on scrapbook paper, minor staining. Washington, DC: H. Polkinhorn, [1856]

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An appeal from the long struggle to complete the Washington Monument, at that point languishing at a half-built 170 feet. It urges officials across the nation to put up donation boxes at the polling places during the upcoming elections. Five cents from each citizen was deemed enough to get the job done. "It will be astonishing and mortifying, if out of twenty-five millions of souls who inhabit this great country, rendered independent, prosperous and happy mainly by his exertions and devotion to its cause, the sum necessary to erect a monument worthy of such a man could not be completed for the want of a small pecuniary aid." The officers and managers of the Washington National Monument Society are listed, including President Franklin Pierce and Washington mayor John Towers (who took office in June 1854). We trace no other example of this broadside in OCLC, at auction, or elsewhere, though the text was run as a paid advertisement in the Freeport (IL) Daily Journal from 20 May to 13 June 1856.