Catholic Total Abstinence Union Fountain, Philadelphia
The Centennial Fountain of the Catholic Total Abstinence Union, also known as "The Centennial Fountain", was built in West Fairmont Park in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in 1876 to celebrate, along with other exhibits, the 100th anniversary of the United States' Declaration of Independence at the first official world exhibition in the United States, the Centennial International Exhibition. The monumental work was created by the German-born sculptor Herman Kirn on behalf of the Catholic Total Abstinence Union.
The fountain is in the shape of a Maltese cross with 3-metre-high figures at the outer points. They represent four prominent Catholics of the US American revolutionary period: Fleet Admiral John Barry, Archbishop John Carroll, Senator Charles Carroll and the preacher, Father Theobald Mathew. In the centre of the 16-tonne figures is Moses as the central figure, gesticulating into the sky, indicating the sky as the source of all water. The central figure of Moses reaches a height of 5.8 metres and was made from a 40-tonne block (from the Zelim Quarry). On 18th June 1910, lightning struck the marble statue of Father Matthew and destroyed the statue. The artist Herman Kirn, already in his old age, went to Lasa (Laas) and renewed the statue. Kirn himself came to the United States as a child, but returned to his home country to study with Carl Steinhäuser, the director of the "Marble Works of Laas". After the construction of the fountain, he moved back to Philadelphia, where he worked as a restorer for the "Fairmont Park Commission" until the end of his life.
