By Alabama NewsCenter Staff
April 30, 1904
On this day in 1904, the World’s Fair in St. Louis opened with one of its major attractions still trying to get himself together. City leaders in Birmingham hustled to get the 56-foot-tall statue designed and cast in time, but didn’t make opening day.
Weighing 60 tons, the parts of Vulcan were shipped to Missouri from the middle of April until the middle of May. The statue was finished and dedicated on June 7, and was actually christened with water from the Cahaba River.Vulcan won a Grand Prize at the exhibition, and both St. Louis and San Francisco made efforts to buy the statue. Instead, it was disassembled in February 1905, where the parts were dropped off at Red Mountain while competing city groups squabbled over where it should make its home. More than three decades passed before Vulcan found a home on his current perch on Red Mountain.
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