End of the Trail (Wisconsin)

End of the Trail
U.S. National Register of Historic Places
Location	Shaler Park Waupun, Wisconsin
NRHP Reference #	80000136
Added to NRHP	August 29, 1980

The End of the Trail is a sculpture located in Waupun, Wisconsin, United States. It depicts an American Indian brave hanging limp as his horse comes to an abrupt halt just prior to momentum carrying him over an unseen precipice. The sense of an instantaneous stop was created by showing the horse's back legs as airborne, as well as his tail and the brave's ponytails rushing forward. It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1980.^[1]

History

The statue was sculpted by James Earle Fraser after it was commissioned by Clarence Shaler as a tribute to the Native Americans.^[2] It is a copy cast in bronze of a plaster statue by Fraser that gained notoriety at the 1915 Panama-Pacific International Exposition. The original was moved from Visalia, California to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma in 1968, where it was restored and is now on display at the National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum. The City of Visalia received a bronze replica as a replacement.

A smaller bronze copy of the statue is on the campus of Winona State University in Fraser's home town, Winona, Minnesota.

A painting of the statue's image appeared on the original cover of the 1971 album Surf's Up by the Beach Boys.

References

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