The Statue of Liberty was a gift from France to the United States in 1876 to celebrate the 100th anniversary of independence. In June 1885, the statue of the goddess was packed and shipped to New York. In October 1886, the then US President Cleveland personally presided over the unveiling ceremony in New York. The steel bracket inside the bronze statue was designed and produced by the architect Villebourduc and the French engineer Gustave Eiffel who later built the world-famous Eiffel Tower in Paris.
The entire bronze statue uses 120 tons of steel as the skeleton, 80 tons of copper sheets as the outer skin, and is assembled and fixed on the bracket with 300,000 rivets. The spiral staircase inside the statue of the goddess allows visitors to climb to its head, which is equivalent to climbing a 12-story building.
The Statue of Liberty is placed on a 47-meter-high concrete base. The base was built with $100,000 raised by the famous capitalist Joseph Pulitzer. The base has become the Museum of American Immigration History.
On the base of the granite statue is engraved a popular sonnet "The New Giant" by the American poet Emmanuelle Roche: "Let those who long to breathe the free air , and people who are exhausted after long journeys and have no money, lean on each other and fall into my arms! I stand at the golden gate, holding high the light of freedom."
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The symbolic value of the Statue of Liberty lies in two basic factors. It was a gift from France to the United States on the 100th anniversary of its independence to affirm the historical alliance between the two countries. It was funded by international donations in recognition of the principles of freedom and democracy established in the United States' Declaration of Independence, which the statue holds in its left hand.
The statue also quickly became and remains a symbol of immigration to the United States from many countries in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. She has remained a highly powerful symbol - inspiring thought, debate and protest against ideals such as freedom, peace, human rights, the abolition of slavery, democracy and opportunity.