A new statue representing the commonwealth's role to integrate schools will be unveiled during 2025 in the National Statuary Hall inside the U.S. Capitol.
The statue of civil rights activist Barbara Rose Johns is nearly complete, according to the Commission for Historical Statues in the U.S. Capitol. In 2020, the Virginia General Assembly established the commission to remove and replace the Robert E. Lee statue that has represented the commonwealth — along with one of George Washington — in the Capitol building.
Johns, who died in 1991, led a strike of more than 400 students who attended the segregated Robert Russa Moton High School in Farmville on April 23, 1951. She was 16 years old.
The students later sued — and their case joined others to become part of the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision that ruled segregation in schools was unconstitutional.
Artist Steven Weitzman sculpted a full-scale clay model of Johns at his Brentwood, Maryland, studio with guidance from Johns’ family, the commission and the curator’s office of the Architect of the Capitol.
In May, the full-scale clay model was taken to be cast at Laran Bronze, a foundry in Chester, Pennsylvania.
Julie Langan, director of Virginia’s Department of Historic Resources, is one of eight commission members overseeing the work’s creation.
“The statue is almost complete, and I am hopeful that it will be ready for final review and approval by the Commission early in 2025,” she wrote in an email.
Once a finish is applied to the Johns statue, it’ll be brought back to Weitzman’s studio for final touch ups and then placed atop a granite pedestal. The commission and the Joint Committee on the Library will provide final approval of the statue before its installation in Statuary Hall.
“Virginians can expect an unveiling in the coming year,” Langan said. A ceremony to publicly unveil the Johns statue has not yet been set.
