The Suez Canal and the Statue of Liberty

​          A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
          Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
          Mother of Exiles. . . .
                   “. . . Give me your tired, your poor,
          Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free . . .”
                      - Emma Lazarus, “The New Colossus”

In the late 1960s I spent a year on a high plateau seven thousand feet above the Red Sea. For most of a century, goods shipped from Europe had passed from the Mediterranean into the Red Sea (and on to Asia) by way of the Suez Canal. Unfortunately for us, the canal had been closed in 1967 as a result of Egyptian/Israeli war and would not re-open until 1975. Our supplies came by the long route around the southern tip of Africa.

Had I visited the nonfunctioning Suez Canal—there was no reason to do so—one thing I would not have seen was a colossal figure of a draped woman holding a torch aloft. French sculptor Auguste Bartholi had intended it to stand at the northern entry to the canal, which opened in 1869. He showed his design, called “Egypt Carrying the Light to Asia,” to the Egyptian viceroy Ismail Pasha. However, already deep in debt on the canal project, Egypt rejected the plan for reasons of cost.

Seeking another buyer, Bartholi tweaked his design to appeal to Americans. The title changed to “Liberty Enlightening the World.” The flowing robes of an Egyptian peasant became the garb of a Roman goddess. After mixed reviews, private appeals raised enough donations in France for the statue and in the United States for the pedestal, which cost nearly as much. Emma Lazarus wrote “The New Colossus” as part of the fundraising effort. Best known as the Statue of Liberty, the ”mighty woman with a torch” was dedicated in New York Harbor on October 28, 1886. The opening of Ellis Island six years later to process arrivals from Europe made Lady Liberty a symbol of welcome to tired, poor immigrants for all time.

Images, cropped: (left) Bartholi’s design for “Egypt Carrying the Light to Asia; (right) the Statue of Liberty.