Sculpture: steel, painted; Base: concrete, black granite; Plaza: concrete, brick
Type:
Sculptures-Outdoor Sculpture
Sculptures-Arch
Sculptures
Owner/Location:
Administered by City of Vancouver Parks & Recreation P.O. Box 1995 Vancouver Washington 98668
Located Vancouver Landing Columbia Street Vancouver Washington
Date:
Dedicated Oct. 31, 1992
Notes:
Save Outdoor Sculpture, Washington survey, 1995.
Image on file.
(On inner granite facing of east base:) CAPTAIN/GEORGE/VANCOUVER/MONUMENT/October 31, 1792/ Lt. William Broughton/Named This Area/For His Captain/Dedicated/October 31, 1992 (On inner granite facing of west base:) BOAT OF/DISCOVERY/"...The real story of/George Vancouver and/other explorers of the/Pacific Northwest is not/in one great voyage. It is/in the hundreds of lesser/voyages made by the small/boats, thoroughness and/unfailing courage with which/these tasks were carried out through the long years of/exploration of the Great River/of the West, the Columbia River.
(On first plaque on plaza wall:) 1792 DISCOVERY/Capt. George Vancouver, from King's Lynn, England, at age 35/and with orders from the British Admiralty to explore/and chart the West Coast of America, charted hundreds/of miles of coastline from California to Alaska. His maps/were so accurate that they were later used in establishing/boundaries between the Spanish, the English, the Russians/and the Americans./During the return voyage of his expedition, Capt. Vancouver/commissioned Lt. William Broughton to enter the Columbia/River in long boats to explore inland. It was during this/venture that the area was proclaimed in the name of/England and was charted in honor of Capt. George Vancouver./Capt. Vancouver with his crews of the H.M.S. Discovery/and the H.M.S. Chatham returned to England and published/his famous journals and maps. He subsequently died at/age 40 in 1797./Some years later, in 1824, Dr. John McLoughlin and Sir/George Simpson, of the Hudson Bay Company, using the/accurate journal and map published by Capt. George/Vancouver, established the first permanent settlement in/the Pacific Northwest and named it Fort Vancouver.
(On center plaque on plaza wall:) CAPT. GEORGE VANCOUVER/MONUMENT PLAZA/ This etching replicates the/map produced by Lt. William/Broughton as he explored and charted the Columbia River/from a 24-foot long boat. The/exploration some 100 miles/inland commenced from the H.M.S./Chatham on October 23, 1792. The/exploration party returned past this/point October 31 enroute to the mouth/of this great river. During his journey, Lt. Broughton named many of the/natural features including Mt. Hood/ and Mt. St. Helens. He named this area for his captain, George Vancouver. (On third plaque on plaza wall are listed the names of private and corporate sponsors of the monument, city and state officials and monument committee members) unsigned
The information provided about this artwork was compiled as part of the Smithsonian American Art Museum's Inventories of American Painting and Sculpture database, designed to provide descriptive and location information on artworks by American artists in public and private collections worldwide.
Summary:
The unclad keel of a long boat made of steel and painted red. It sits high over a walkway, and is supported by two pyramidal concrete bases with polished black granite facings, one under each end. The bases are on either side of the brick-walled walkway and the boat keel acts as an arch over it. The sculpture is placed in a plaza of sloping, rounded brick-topped walls. Set in one wall of the plaza is a series of three plaques. Starting at the top of the plaque on the proper right, a replica of the original charted map of the Columbia River continues across and down the other two plaques, to end near the bottom of the plaque on the proper left.
