West Lafayette, IN – An 18-foot bronze statue, “The Boilermaker,” was installed on September 26, 2005, at the top of the stairs on North University Drive between the Intercollegiate Athletic Facility and the Mollenkopf Athletic Center at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana.  At 8:30 a.m., the Boilermaker Special and a police escort led the truck transporting the statue from the Purdue Airport through campus to the installation site.  Jay Cooperider, associate athletics director, said great effort was put into the final design of the statue.

“The statue represents a timeless boilermaker,” Cooperider said. “We researched old photographs, records and newspaper articles to find out what real boilermakers wore when they worked in boiler rooms and combined the 19th century notion of a locomotive boilermaker with that of more modern imagery.”

In 1891, a newspaper headline chided the “burly boilermakers from Purdue” after the football team recorded a 44-0 victory over rival Wabash College. Newspapers picked up on the term, and the Boilermakers quickly became the university's team name.

Sculptor Jon Hair of Cornelius, N.C., began work on the statue in 2003 on behalf of an anonymous donor who wanted to present Purdue with a statue of the world's largest boilermaker. Hair has constructed statues for several universities and has done commissioned work for the U.S. Olympic Team.  Hair said the statue should serve as a monument for generations of future Boilermakers.

“We have bronzes in our country and in the world that are more than 5,000 years old,” Hair said. “With the technological advances we have today, bronze statues can last 10,000 years. It's neat to think the statue could have that kind of longevity.”

The process by which Hair constructed the statue is complex. Sketches first were submitted to a committee for approval. The original sculpture was created as a 24" high maquette and reviewed by the committee. 

“The sculpture was then enlarged to 18 feet in a process during which a mold was made by coating the sculpture with silicone rubber backed with a fiberglass shell,” says Jeff Harman, owner of Joseph Bronze.  “The mold was used to create a wax reproduction 1/2" thick.  This was cut into 135 pieces, each of which was encased in a shell of fused silica.  The shells were heated in an oven to 1500 degrees, which melts out the wax and hardens the shell.  2000-degree molten bronze is then poured into the shell to replace the lost wax (hence, the lost wax process).  After the bronze has cooled, the shell is broken away and the pieces are ready to assemble in bronze.”

“Each piece is TIG welded together,” Harman continues.  “High speed die grinders with carbide bits are used to grind and blend the welds.  When the sculpture was completed, a combination of heat, liver of sulfur, and ferric oxide was applied as the patina, which gives the sculpture its rich red and brown color.”

The sculpture weighs 5700 lbs., including its stainless steel infrastructure engineered to withstand 70 mph winds.

Hair said that after such a laborious process, he is happy to have put a small stamp on the home of the Boilermakers.

“I am proud to have a piece of art at such a prestigious university as Purdue,” Hair said.

The statue was dedicated at 2 p.m. on November 4 to celebrate the completion of the phase one renovation of Ross-Ade Stadium. Purdue President Martin C. Jischke and Morgan J. Burke, director of intercollegiate athletics, made remarks about the statue and the tradition it represents.

THE ARTIST

The most highly commissioned monumental sculptor in the U.S. with 16 major public art commissions in the last four years alone, Jon Hair has solidified his place as a force in American sculpture.

A 35-foot bronze and steel monument entitled “Olympic Strength” has created ripples of excitement in both the art and sports worlds. Commissioned by the United States Olympic Committee, the sculpture features four heroic Olympic athletes lifting a huge globe on their shoulders. Towering nearly forty feet into the Colorado sky, “Olympic Strength” is destined to become the signature piece of the U.S. Olympic Center in Colorado Springs.

Currently being cast in bronze is a 24-foot tall sculpture of Captain Christopher Newport, the swashbuckling fleet commander who established the first permanent English settlement at Jamestown in 1607. One of the largest historic portrait bronzes in America, more than one million people are expected to visit the monument in 2007 in Newport News, Virginia. The recently completed massive bronze “Boilermaker” rises 20-feet high as the crowning jewel of newly renovated Ross-Ade Stadium.

Other current commissions include The Olympic Truce Foundation in Athens, Greece, The U.S. Air Force Academy and The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences.

Jon’s sculptures have appeared in galleries, in private collections and on a growing number of corporate and college campuses. His work has appeared in Southwest Art, Sculpture Review, Wildlife Art, Robb Report and Art World News magazines.

Before embarking on a professional career, Jon majored in fine arts at The Ohio State University in Columbus and The Columbus College of Art & Design. He also taught art classes at The University of Akron in Akron, Ohio where he served on the Board of Advisors for the College of Fine Arts. Jon built a reputation as one of the most award-winning Art Directors and Designers in the country. Clients included IBM, General Electric, Siemens and Cendant Corporation. Jon includes a Gold Award in the prestigious Broadcast Design Art Directors’ International Design Competition among the many awards he has won for his design work. He has also designed several original typefaces and is a published cartoonist.

An accomplished musician, Jon worked with such noted performers as Simon and Garfunkel, Jonathan Edwards, The Main Ingredient and The Swingle Singers before pursuing a career in art.

In 2003, Jon was designated an “Official Sculptor To The U.S. Olympic Team” and an “Official Sculptor To The U.S. Olympic Committee”. He is also a member of the National Sculpture Society.  Jon Hair currently resides and works in Cornelius, North Carolina.

Small bronze sculptures of the Boilermaker statue can be purchased by contacting www.jonhair.com.

Sources: Marydell Forbes, Purdue News Service, Morgan J. Burke, Jay Cooperider, Greg Christopher, Jon Hair http://www.jonhair.com