‘Miss American Green Cross’ was created in 1928 by sculptor Frederick Willard Potter, his model Verlyn Sumner who posed for the bronze figure. The work was made for the American Reforestation Association (incorporated in LA 1923, renamed in 1926) American Green Cross, a short lived environmental group. The visible words on the base read: “Help Save Our Trees; Dedicated to The American Green Cross, by Glendale Chapter No 1; MCMXXVIII; The Forest Is The Mother Of The Rivers.” The sculpture is displayed near Brand Library and Art Center since 1992, but was original erected in 1928 at Broadway & Verdugo Roads intersection at the corner of Broadway High School (now Glendale High School). Also later other locations, and fates including being crashed into by a car, moved, vandalised, damaged, abandonment, lost, rediscovered, finally restoration work by local artist Ron Pekar and installed in this location in Brand Park. This monument is quite a surprise to see for the first time, it challenges ones iconographic expectations. Though it is a fine piece of artistic work of its period promoting a most worthy ecological cause. Brand Library & Art Center, Brand Park, Glendale, LA, California, USA
Location: Brand Park, Glendale, LA, CA, USA
Photographer: richard keith wolff
