History of Preston County West Virginia United States of America

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William Rudoff O'Donovan, sculptor, was born in Preston county, Va., March 28, 1844; son of James Hayes and Mary (Bright) O'Donovan; grandson of Jeremiah and Jenette (Dunbar) O'Donovan, who were forced to escape to America in consequence of participation in the revolution of 1798, and a descendant of the elder branch of the O'Donovans. He was self-taught in the sculpter's art. As a boy he served in the Confederate army, and in 1865 he removed to New York city, where he opened a studio as a sculptor. He was elected an associate of the National Academy of Design in 1878, and a member of the Society of American Artists in 1880, of the Architectural League in 1887, and of the National Sculpture society at its formation in 1896. The subjects of his many portrait busts and bas reliefs include: The Hon. John A. Kennedy (1876); William Page, N.A., Winslow Homer, N.A., and Thomas Eakins of Philadelphia (1877); Erminnie A. Smith and E Swain Gifford, N.A. (1879); Edmund C. Stedman, Arthur Quartley, N.A., Walt Whitman (1892); Gert. Joseph Wheeler (1896): President Charles P. Duly, for the American Geographical society (1899), and the Hon. Andrew H. Green (1900). He also executed a memorial tablet to Bayard Taylor, for Cornell university; a statue of Archbishop Hughes, for St. John's college, Fordham, N.Y.; a statue of General Wagner, for Charleston, S.C.; statues of Washington, for the government of Venezuela (1880); for the monument commemorating the peace of Newburgh, N.Y. (1886-87), and for the Trenton battle monument, and also for the interior of the latter; a bust of Gen. William S. Stryker, late president of the Trenton Battle Monument association; equestrian statues of Lincoln and Grant, for the soldiers' and sailors' arch, Prospect Park, Brooklyn, N.Y.; a monument to the captors of Andr? at Tarrytown, N.Y.; two figures for the soldiers' monument at Lawrence, Mass.; two bas-reliefs for the monument commemorating the battle of Oriskany (1883), and many other works of equal importance. He is the author of a series of papers on the Portraits of Washington.

From: Twentieth Century Biographical Dictionary of Notable Americans, Johnson, Rossiter, editor

History of Preston County West Virginia

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