Chilligavva

Human Statue of Liberty at camp Dodge, Iowa. I happened to Stumble onto it..

For whatever reason, an 89 year old photo taken in Iowa is making its way around the internet. Many people who see the picture find it hard to believe it’s real. Mike Vogt, curator for the Gold Star Military Museum at Camp Dodge, says they received dozens of e-mails last week questioning if it’s a doctored image. Vogt says, in fact, it’s a real photo called "The Human Statue of Liberty." The photo was taken in August 1918 by Arthur Mole. Vogt says Mole and another photographer, John D. Thomas, traveled the country taking photos of soldiers who were grouped together to form various "patriotic" patterns. Over 18,000 soldiers were used in the Camp Dodge photo that was taken from an 80 foot high tower. Mole and Thomas went to great lengths to make sure the human statue was proportionally correct. "It’s an interesting exercise in survey and mathematic techniques to have the photographer perched in an 80 foot high tower and have all the soldiers fall in exactly where they needed to be,"

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