Luzerne County committee approves Ellen Webster Palmer statue restoration

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After more than a decade on the back burner, a Luzerne County Council committee agreed to earmark natural-gas recreation funding to restore a statue of Ellen Webster Palmer so it can be returned to the county courthouse lawn.

The 1,200-pound marble statue, which depicts Palmer flanked by a breaker boy and young miner, has significant damage caused by weather, acid rain exposure, vandalism and other factors, officials said. It was moved off site around 2007.

Palmer established the Boys’ Industrial Association in Wilkes-Barre in the 1890s to educate and provide social activities for working children. She spent evenings teaching boys after they labored at coal mines during the day.

An inscription at the bottom of the statue reads: “Life is a tool to work with, not a toy to play with.”

Council’s Act 13 Committee approved the allocation during its meeting Monday night. The committee oversees natural-gas recreation funding expenditures.

County council must ratify the committee’s decision for it to take effect.

The Baut Studios Inc. in Swoyersville, which has been keeping the statue safe, submitted the lone bid last August to complete all requested work for $47,130, which would include cleaning/sealing, replacing damaged/missing facial features, resetting the heads, filling major fractures and returning the statue to the county.

While $47,130 was requested based on the bid, the committee agreed to approve the restoration in an amount to be negotiated by county Manager Romilda Crocamo because nearly a year has passed since the submission.

Council Vice Chairman Brian Thornton and colleagues Kevin Lescavage and Patty Krushnowski serve on the Act 13 committee.

Crocamo made the request and said the Palmer statue base is in place on the south lawn of the courthouse on River Street in Wilkes-Barre.

“Mrs. Palmer did a lot for our area, and I think it would be good project to complete,” she told the committee.

The county is putting more emphasis on the south lawn statues and military memorials, Crocamo said.

“I want to make an effort so county residents and visitors know the rich history we have here,” Crocamo said.

The military monuments will be featured as part of a county website update that is in the planning stages, she said, noting “there is a lot of symbolism on those that people may not realize.”

A dedication of the south lawn deer statue is planned for the end of the month, Crocamo said. That iconic statue had been restored through a Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission grant and natural-gas recreation funding.

The deer is the oldest public sculpture in the city, dating back to 1866.

It was moved from Public Square in the city’s downtown to River Street around the time the courthouse opened in June 1909, news accounts say.

Robert Wood & Company of Philadelphia, which built an iron fence surrounding the county’s third courthouse on Public Square, had produced the statue as a bonus.

The sculpture was featured in at least two postcards of the county courthouse around 1940 and 1943.

Generations of Wyoming Valley residents have playfully posed with the deer, as evidenced by a collection of photos that had been gathered by Tony Brooks, a Wilkes-Barre councilman and chairman of the Wilkes-Barre Preservation Society.

The county received its latest annual natural-gas allocation of $237,750 in June, boosting the fund’s balance to $458,563, county Budget/Finance Division Head Mary Roselle told the committee.

In addition to periodic earmarks for internal and external projects, the county has used some of the funding for black fly spraying along the Susquehanna River and maintenance of the River Common recreation area.

The county has received funding from natural gas drilling annually since the state authorized such earmarks under Act 13 in 2012.

Reach Jennifer Learn-Andes at 570-991-6388 or on Twitter @TLJenLearnAndes.