Wilton Bulletin
Gifford Proctor's statue to be unveiled Saturday in Wilton
Oct 12, 2006

During the darkest days of America�s fight for independence, and in the darkest hours of the harsh winter that killed thousands of troops at Valley Forge, General George Washington stood alone, beset by wind and pelting snow, but also by doubt and uncertainty.

This is the Washington that Gifford Proctor envisioned as a young man in the 1930�s, and for close to 70 years he worked to capture that image in sculpture, first with a three-foot model, then later with larger statues and busts as the image was revised, reworked, and went through an adventure all its own.

On Saturday, Oct. 14, an eight-foot tall model of the statue, which will one day be expanded to stand 20 feet tall and is expected to be placed at Valley Forge, will be unveiled in a ceremony at Mr. Proctor�s studio at the home of Sylvia Keiser at 105 Seeley Road. Mr. Proctor died on June 16, but left the task of completing the statue to Ms. Keiser, a lifelong friend and fellow sculptor, who is holding an open house from 1 to 5:30 to share the statue with the town of Wilton.

�The town and its people were special to him,� said Peter Keiser of the choice to unveil the statue in Wilton first. Mr. Proctor first came to Wilton in 1929 and lived in town off and on until 1964. He returned in 1983 and lived here until his death.

The statue being viewed will be a painted foam core from which sculptors will take measurements and proportions in preparation to enlarge the piece to the full size of 20 feet. After that, the final piece, which will most likely be made of a metal other than bronze, would be placed at Valley Forge in Pennsylvania.

�In the end, what he wanted to do was take a slice of life or feeling and give it a face, a symbol,� said Blair Proctor, Mr. Proctor�s son who flew in from California to help arrange the unveiling.

Mr. Keiser said Mr. Proctor�s vision of Washington was cemented when he won the �Prix de Rome� in 1934 and traveled to Italy for two years to study at the American Academy. There he saw the evil and oppression of fascism under Mussolini, said Mr. Keiser.

�It impressed upon him how important democracy was,� he said.

Graphically, Mr. Proctor sought to capture Washington at his darkest hour, when all seemed to be lost, to tell the story of how this one man embodied the American spirit.

Hindsight allows Americans to see Washington as the triumphant victor, but at Valley Forge he was a man very much troubled with doubt, said Mr. Keiser. Washington watched as his men died of hunger in the cold and snow while American businesses traded nearby with British troops for food and clothing. His men were quickly losing faith in him, and there was talk of abandoning the camp by many of his senior officers.

�What Gifford would say was �He [Washington] had to wonder sometimes, because everyone and everything was against him�,� said Mr. Keiser.

A long journey

The statue residents are invited to see has been a long time coming, with several periods when things moved slowly. In the late 1980�s a 10-foot version arrived from the foundry, but had been cut into segments � unbeknownst to Mr. Proctor � and crashed to the floor, setting work back several decades.

�It�s been an incredible journey and a series of misses,� said Mr. Keiser.

The project, for Mr. Proctor, was a labor of love, and one he spent much of his time trying to perfect, said his son.

�So many people, going by on Seeley Road at all hours, remember seeing that light on in Gifford�s studio,� said Mr. Keiser.

His father, said Mr. Proctor, was �unwilling to go the modern way,� preferring the traditional methods of sculpting and enlarging what he grew up learning from his father, noted American West sculptor Alexander Phimister.

The project has taken a more modern turn in recent years, with the model being laser scanned into a computer, and the foam enlargement being produced with the automated proportion calculations made by machine, not man, though the finishing touches were completed by hand.

�There are a lot of people who have been behind this for 20 years,� said Mr. Keiser.

Sculptor Vincent DeFelice, of Spokane, Wash., was visiting his brother-in-law, Jim Donahue here in Wilton years ago when he first saw the sculpture, said Mr. Keiser.

�He immediately offered to help, he wanted to be a part of it,� he said.

Recently Mr. DeFelice has been working on the foam model, helping to enlarge it along with sculptor Peter Ross of the Tallix Company in Beacon, N.Y. The endeavor was assisted by Patrick Skidd, who was Mr. Proctor�s assistant.

While work will continue to gain support for the project, both emotional and financial, the Proctors and Keisers are also working to firm up plans to place the statue at Valley Forge, ideally on Mount Joy, a location Mr. Proctor chose and was granted by the national parks in the 1940�s after President Harry Truman threw his support behind the project.

�The site was approved for that statue,� said Mr. Proctor. �Then the war came and it was �we don�t have metal to make that statue.� �

While much is needed to complete the work that was Mr. Proctor�s dream for 70 years, the Proctors and Keisers feel the unveiling Saturday will not only be a celebration of Mr. Proctor�s life, but also of the ideals and emotions he sought to portray through the sculpture.

At 2 p.m. the families will hold a brief ceremony at the studio, and will be available throughout the day to answer questions and share their memories. Light refreshments will be served.

Parking is available in the field across from the Keiser home, at the corner of Seeley and Cannon roads.

� Copyright by Hersam Acorn newspapers