Masaryk memorial

  • CountryUS
  • Town:IL Chicago

  • Year of creation:1949

  • Rider(s):Masaryk memorial

    (1850–1937) was an Austrian, Czech, politician, sociologist and philosopher who as an eager advocate of Czechoslovak independence during World War I became the founder and first President of Czechoslovakia. He originally wished to reform the Austro-Hungarian monarchy into a democratic federal state, but during the First World War he began to favor the abolition of the monarchy and, with the help of the Allied Powers, eventually succeeded. Masaryk died less than two years after leaving office in Lány, Czechoslovakia.

  • Sculptor(s):Polasek, Albin

    (1879 – 1965) was a Czech-American sculptor and educator. He created more than four hundred works during his career, two hundred of which are now displayed in the Albin Polasek Museum and Sculpture Gardens in Winter Park, Florida.
Description:

The Thomas Masaryk Memorial commemorates Czechoslovakia’s first president and former University of Chicago professor Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk. The work personifies one of the legends of the Czech people. In the centre of the province of Bohemia is the Blanik Mountain, under which sleeps a heroic company of medieval knights. It is said that when their countrymen on earth are oppressed, the mountain will open and these ancient warriors will ride to the rescue. Legend has it that during World War I, the knights appeared in the persons of Masaryk and his legionnaires, founding a new, free country after 300 years of oppression.

The plaque reads …

Rising out of the fertile Bohemian soil, the Blanik Mountain stands eternally vigilant, its verdant slopes sheltering a wealth of age-old folklore. According to an old legend, slumbering within its cool mountainous depths, the Blanik Knights stand guard, ready to ride forth with Saint Wenceslaus to lead them in their nation’s hour of need ..

Tomas Garrigue Masaryk Czechoslovakia’s first President symbolized in flesh this legendary vigilance, when in the fury of World War I. His Czechoslovak Legions fought to realize the the nation’s fondest dreams. Thus cast in bronze the Blanik Knight is but a monumental symbol of Thomas G. Masaryk’s eternally valid ideals of freedom, democracy and humanity …

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