Washington Duke who began the family's tie to Trinity College with a donation of money for buildings and endowment in 1890 is memorialized by a unique seated statue on East Campus. After Duke's death in 1905 a spontaneous movement developed among friends to honor him. Organizers from Richmond, Virginia signed a curiously worded contract for "a seated bronze statue, size as if standing 7 feet" with native sculptor Edward Virginius Valentine. Known as "the South's greatest sculptor," Valentine then sixty-seven years old, had studied abroad in Paris, Florence and Berlin.
Campus Statuary Website
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