Pony Express
Old Oregon Trail
George Washington
Abraham Lincoln
Winter Quarters
Angel Moroni
Hawaii Temple
Jesus Christ
Joseph Smith
Brigham Young
US Capitol Building
Three Witnesses
The Family
Prominent People
War Memorials
Hood Ornaments
Garden Statuary
Children
Animals

Comments are welcome

Books on the Sculptor Avard Fairbanks by Eugene F. Fairbanks:

"A Sculptor's Testimony in Bronze and Stone"

"A Sculpture Garden of Fantasy"

This web site is non-commercial in nature, and was not created for the purposes of selling art. Viewers interested in purchasing art may visit FairbanksArt.com for information regarding the sale of art.

links: LDSMusician.com, LDSMusicNetwork.com, LDSMusicWorld.com, LDSMusic.org, BuyLDSMusic.com,

Medical Physics and Radiation Oncology

The Old Oregon Trail
Ezra Meeker with Avard Fairbanks' Clay Model

The clay model Ezra Meeker is admiring became incorporated into the design of the bronze relief of the Old Oregon Trail.

About Ezra Meeker
The bronze relief is named the Old Oregon Trail because of the influence of the legendary Ezra Meeker, the living relic of an 1852 immigrant pioneer party. By the turn of the century, Ezra Meeker had begun his quest to save the Trail from neglect and oblivion. He re-trekked the trail another four times, calling great public attention to its history. And he placed a remarkable 171 granite markers along it, with the words "Old Oregon Trail".

In 1924 he came to the studio of Avard Fairbanks, the 27 yr old professor of sculpture at the University of Oregon. There, posing for his portrait, they became fast friends. Admiring Avard Fairbanks' works, Mr. Meeker gave the young sculptor the charge to use his talents and his life to honor the memory of the pioneers.

About the Sculpture
This sculptural bronze relief was created in 1924 by Avard Fairbanks while he served on the University of Oregon faculty. It was inspired by his friendship with Oregon Trail Pioneer Ezra Meeker whose passion for recognition and preservation of the Trail was legendary. It depicts a pioneer mother and babe-in-arms in a covered wagon with her husband driving the oxen on a rocky trail.

Original placements of this sculpture are in Baker City and Seaside, Oregon. Additional locations of the monument include Vancouver, Washington and Casper, Wyoming at the National Historic Trails Interpretive Center. The Fairbanks design was also selected for the Oregon Territory Centennial U.S. Postage Commemorative Stamp in 1948. The new bronze casting placed in Boise, Idaho is taken from the sculptor’s original model.

About the Oregon Trail
The Oregon Trail was the “backbone” of transportation in the early American West. Along it traveled the greatest land migration in human history. From 1841 into the 1880’s, nearly one half million pioneers trekked it to settle America’s western frontiers. Some 20,000 perished along the way. It stretched from points along the Missouri River into the Northwest Territories, and it encompassed parts of the California Trails (“Donnor Party,” “49’rs,”etc.), the Utah (“Mormon”) Pioneer Trail, the Pony Express Trail, and the Overland Stages Trail.