3-009-011 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Monument to George Stephenson at Newcastle-on-Tyne, 1862. '...a striking work of art, by Mr. John Graham Lough...It has been erected by public subscription in Neville-street...adjoining the Central Railway Station, and overlooking the busy thoroughfares of Westgate-street and Collingwood-street, up and down the former of which hundreds of workmen employed at Mr. E. Stephenson's engine-factory pass three times a day...On the top of [the] pedestal, rising to a height of 30ft. above the ground, is placed the statue...The great engineer is represented standing in easy but dignified attitude...Grace is given to the modern costume by the Northumbrian plaid, which Stephenson was accustomed to wear, being skilfully combined by the artist with the ordinary frock-coat. The subsidiary figures...[consist of] a blacksmith...naked to the waist...[leaning] against an anvil, while the right hand grasps a hammer; a pitman, holding in his hand...Stephenson's well-known "Geordie" lamp; a platelayer, holding...a model of Stephenson's old "fish-bellied' rail; an engine-driver leaning against the model of the locomotive, the crowning effort of Stephenson's genius. The central statue and the subsidiary figures are cast from the best bronze'. From "Illustrated London News", 1862.