Frozen in Time

A statue named “The Entomologist” is on track to be unveiled in March 2017. The university will have an opening ceremony in April 2017 during the Bug Bowl, a two-day annual festival that attracts up to 30,000 visitors. 

 

The statue is a design of three figures. J.J. Davis, the former head of Purdue’s entomology department in 1920, is in the center. Surrounding Davis is Rachel Carson, who holds a tiger swallowtail butterfly, and John Osmun, Davis’ predecessor and department head in 1959, who is holding a butterfly net.

 

The statue will be made of bronze and is a "work in progress" by sculptor Susie Chisholm of Savannah, Ga. Tom Turpin, an entomology professor at Purdue and member of the committee behind the statue, said the idea is to make it an “interactive” statue, one that will have a sitting area for students and visitors to sit and take pictures with the statue. The project will cost about $200,000 — two-thirds of the funds are from donors. 

 

Though the exact location is unclear, the statue will be somewhere on the front lawn of the Agriculture Administration Building (AGAD) by Pfendler Hall, with landscaping that corresponds to the pollinator garden already nearby. 

 

History comes to life. The idea for a statue came to Turpin about three years ago. Only last year did he convince the planning committee at Purdue that a statue dedicated to entomology and to those who made an impact in the field would be a good idea. 

 

Though the three statue subjects figures grew up in different decades in the 20th century, Turpin said the statue depicts the three at various ages if they were to ever meet each other at the same time — Davis at age 42, Osmun as a little boy at age 7 and Carson post-high school at 17 or 18 years old. 

 

“They are a trio of John having captured a butterfly in a net. Rachel Carson is taking the butterfly out of the net and is holding it in her hand,” Turpin said. “J.J. Davis, as sort of a mentor for all things outreach and education, is sort of standing watching the young woman help the young boy learn about insects.” 

 

The “educational moment” in the statue captures what Turpin said is the outreach and wonder that Purdue tries to keep alive. “When J.J. Davis was hired, he began to accumulate the structure of the department as we know it today,” Turpin said. “He also was really instrumental at putting together what we know as extensions.”

 

Turpin said he thinks the most interesting part of the statue is the butterfly Carson is holding. Unlike the all-bronze statue, the butterfly will be its natural colors. The three will be 25 percent larger than life size, so Davis, who was about 5 feet, 6 inches, will now be 7 feet tall. 

 

Gary Bennett, a professor in urban entomology for Purdue, said the case for having a statue dedicated to the entomology department was a sound one. “I think it brings a lot of attention to our department and gives us a permanent presence on the campus,” he said. 

 

Carson is not an entomologist and is not associated with Purdue in an academic way like Davis and Osmun, but Bennett said she received an homage in the statue because she is nationally known for her environmental advocacy on pesticides in her book Silent Spring. 

 

“She wasn’t accurate in a lot of things she had to say, but she did bring a lot of attention to the misuse of pesticides and environmental concerns,” Bennett said. 

 

Bennett said Carson is a good person to look to in terms of “outreach,” something Purdue achieves by making entomology and its current events known to the general public. 

 

“The whole outreach effort has been very successful and has brought national and international attention to this department,” Bennett said. “That, tied together with the role of Rachel Carson and bringing attention to environmental pollution and environmental contamination, that’s sort of how all of this has come about in terms of the statue.”