Richard Morris Hunt Memorial, ca. 1900.

Richard Morris Hunt, the dean of American architecture and the first American to study at the prestigious Ecole des Beaux-Arts in Paris, died in 1895. Immediately upon his death, friends and colleagues quickly undertook an effort to erect a monument to the man. Initially begun by the Municipal Arts Society (of which Hunt was the first president), the cause was soon taken up by other arts and architectural institutions as well the wealthy families for whom Hunt designed homes. The planned memorial was to be created by Bruce Price with the bust of Hunt and the flanking statues sculpted by Daniel Chester French. On October 23, 1898, the incomplete monument was unveiled. It was erected on Fifth Avenue between 70th and 71st Streets, across the street from Hunt's 1877 Lenox Library. The memorial would finally be completed in 1900 with the addition of the flanking female statues.

Fun Fact! This was not the first likeness of Hunt in New York City. A bust of the well-loved architect already existed by the time of his death. In the early 1880s, as stone cutters were completing work on the William K. Vanderbilt mansion, the architect discovered that the artisans had created his likeness as a tribute. The statue of Hunt, depicted as a stone-cutter, was installed on the roof over the entrance to the house. With the home demolished in 1926, the fate of the statue is unknown (though likely it was destroyed with the house).