How Philip Reed cast the Statue of Freedom

Who was Philip Reed?

Philip Reed, an enslaved laborer, made a prominent contribution to the construction of the Capitol Building in Washington, DC. Reed (previously known as Philip Reid) collaborated in creating the Statue of Freedom that has crowned the dome of the Capitol Building since 1863.

How did Philip Reed contribute to the Statue of Freedom?

Born in 1820, Philip Reed worked at the foundry run by the sculptor Clark Mills and poured the bronze to cast the Statue of Freedom. The statue had been designed by Thomas Crawford in Rome, Italy.

Reed was the only known enslaved person to be laboring on the construction of the Statue when its casting commenced in 1860. Reed was able to deduce how to detach its five piece plaster model. Reed gauged that the joints between the sections could be exposed by employing a pulley and tackle to draw up the lifting ring at the surface of the model. The Statue could then be disconnected into five separate pieces and hauled atop the Capitol Dome.

Philip Reed's legacy

A newspaper correspondent reported in 1863, “the black master-builder lifted the ponderous uncouth masses and bolted them together, joint by joint, piece by piece, till they blended into the majestic ‘Freedom’.”

Reed was emancipated on April 16, 1862 upon Abraham Lincoln’s signing of the Compensated Emancipation Act which freed some enslaved people in the District of Columbia. He was a free man when the construction of the Statue of Freedom was completed on the Capitol Dome on December 2, 1863.

Images:

Model of the Statue of Freedom, 1863. Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division. https://lccn.loc.gov/2009631423

References and Further Reading:

Architect of The Capitol. “Philip Reid and The Statue of Freedom.” 2013. Accessed June 30, 2021, https://www.aoc.gov/explore-capitol-campus/art/statue-freedom/philip-reid.

Fling, Sarah. “Philip Reed: Enslaved Artisan in the President’s Neighborhood.” The White House Historical Association, 5 Dec. 2013, https://www.whitehousehistory.org/philip-reed

Histories of the National Mall. “Philip Reed.” Accessed August 8, 2022, http://mallhistory.org/items/show/485.

United States Senate. “Philip Reid and the Statue of Freedom.” Accessed August 8, 2022, https://www.senate.gov/artandhistory/history/common/generic/Civil_War_ReidPhilip_StatueofFreedom.htm.