Benjamin Franklin National
Memorial
143 S. Third Street
Philadelphia, PA 19106
Phone
Visitor Information
(800) 537-7676
Park Headquarters
(215) 597-8787
WELCOME to Benjamin Franklin
National Memorial
Benjamin Franklin National Memorial, located
in the rotunda of the Franklin Institute in Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania, features a colossal seated statue of Benjamin
Franklin. The 20 foot high memorial, sculpted by James Earle
Fraser between 1906 and 1911, honors the writer, inventor and
American statesman.
The statue weighs 30 tons and sits on a
92-ton pedestal of white Seravezza marble. The statue is the focal
piece of the memorial hall, designed by John T. Windrim after the
Pantheon, dedicated in 1938.
Congress designated the national memorial on
October 25, 1972 (Public Law 92-551). Unlike most national
memorials, the statue is not listed on the National Register of
Historic Places. The national memorial is an affiliated area of
the National Park Service, assigned to Independence National
Historical Park through a Memorandum of Agreement entered into on
November 6, 1973.
Under the terms of the agreement, the
Institute owns and maintains the publicly accessible memorial, and
the Park Service includes the memorial in official publications
and otherwise cooperates with the Institute in all appropriate and
mutually agreeable ways on behalf of the memorial.
Public Law 109-153 (December 30, 2005)
authorizes the Secretary of the Interior to make available to the
Institute up to $10,000,000 in matching grants for the
rehabilitation of the memorial and for the development of related
exhibits. This appropriation commemorates the 300th anniversary of
the Franklin's birth on January 17, 1706.
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