Crews arranged by Dallas officials removed a statue of Robert E Lee from a pedestal Thursday and carted it away from a park named for the Confederate general.
In an unannounced move, a large crane was brought through the city by a police escort to Lee Park, where it lifted the large statue from its pedestal late Thursday afternoon.
City officials said in a statement that an art conservator monitored the proper handling of the statue, and police tactical officers with automatic rifles provided security.
The statue was lowered onto a flatbed trailer for transport to an abandoned naval air station owned by the city on its western outskirts.
Crews arranged by Dallas officials removed a statue of Robert E Lee from a pedestal Thursday and carted it away from a park named for the Confederate general
In an unannounced move, a large crane was brought through the city by a police escort to Lee Park, where it lifted the large statue from its pedestal late Thursday afternoon
City officials said in a statement that an art conservator monitored the proper handling of the statue, and police tactical officers with automatic rifles provided security
The statue was lowered onto a flatbed trailer for transport to an abandoned naval air station owned by the city on its western outskirts
The 14-foot-tall, 6-ton statue depicting Lee on horseback flanked by an anonymous Confederate soldier was erected in what was originally called Oak Lawn Park
President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the statue in 1936 as part of the Texas Centennial celebration
It’s expected to remain there until city officials decide the statue’s future.
The 14-foot-tall, 6-ton statue depicting Lee on horseback flanked by an anonymous Confederate soldier was erected in what was originally called Oak Lawn Park.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the statue in 1936 as part of the Texas Centennial celebration.
The Dallas City Council voted on September 6 to remove the statue but was met with a series of delays, including a brief court stay obtained by a pro-Confederacy group and a collision between a semitrailer and a crane assigned to remove the statue.
The truck driver was killed.
On September 1, a judge in Virginia heard arguments but didn’t issue a final ruling on whether a lawsuit over Charlottesville’s decision to remove a similar monument that helped spark a violent white nationalist rally should proceed.
After a hearing on a motion by city attorneys to dismiss the lawsuit, the judge sided with Charlottesville on some points, tossing them from further consideration.
Last month, Heather Heyer (above) was killed by a suspected white supremacist who came to Charlottesville, Virginia to protest the planned removal of a Lee statue
But he said he needed more time to study the ‘main issue,’ the question of whether a state law on memorials for war veterans amended in the 1990s applies retroactively, protecting the statue of Lee.
White nationalists descended on Charlottesville last month, in part to protest the city’s plan to take the statue out of a downtown park and sell it.
Fights broke out before the rally got started, with attendees and counterprotesters brawling in the streets.
After authorities forced the crowd to disperse, a car rammed into a group of people protesting the white nationalists, killing one woman, Heather Heyer, 32, and injuring many more.
Since then, Charlottesville has shrouded the monument, and one of Confederate Gen. Thomas ‘Stonewall’ Jackson, with a black tarp as a symbol of mourning for Heyer.
Heyer’s name was spray painted onto a statue of Lee in Roanoke, Virginia, according to police.
The Roanoke City Police are looking into the defacement of the memorial in downtown Roanoke.
President Donald Trump claimed Thursday that some of the counter-protesters at the rally in Charlottesville were ‘very bad people,’ doubling down on his position that both sides were responsible for the violence that took place.
Trump came under fire last month for his claims that there were ‘very fine people on both sides’ of the clash and ‘many sides’ were to blame for the conflict that left one person dead.
The topic came back up during a question and answer session with journalists on Air Force One this afternoon as Trump returned from Florida.
The president mentioned the left-wing movement Antifa, which stands for anti-facist, and said, ‘If you look at what’s going on there, you know, you have some pretty bad dudes on the other side also. And essentially that’s what I said.’