Did you know? There's a little bit of LIC at Grand Central Terminal

Image source: Kadellar on Wikimedia Commons – Transportation at Grand Central Terminal

We’re not talking transportation from LIC, but Transportation – the 1,500-ton statue that sits above the central portal at Grand Central Terminal on 42nd Street, that was carved in LIC. In a recent NYT article on the birth of GCT (it is 100 years old this year), the Times has published and excerpt from the new book, Grand Central by Sam Roberts. The statue Transportation is mentioned in regard to the “final touches” on the Terminal:

Among the last was Transportation, the gigantic sculpture designed by a Frenchman, Jules Félix Coutan, above the central portal on 42nd Street. Coutan, who also designed the France of the Renaissance sculpture for the extravagant Alexander III bridge in Paris, created a one-fourth-size plaster model in his studio from which John Donnelly, a native of Ireland, carved the final 1,500-ton version from Indiana limestone at the William Bradley & Son yards in Long Island City, Queens.

We think that’s pretty cool.

100 Years of Grandeur – The Birth of Grand Central Terminal [NYT]