John Carroll Statue on the Georgetown University Campus
When Healy Hall was built in the late 1870s, there were plans to place statues of St. Ignatius, the founder of the Jesuit Order, and John Carroll, the founder of Georgetown, in niches either side of the portico at the north end of the building. However, President Patrick F. Healy, S.J., who planned the building and for whom it is named, struggled to raise enough money to fully complete it and the statues were never commissioned. As a result, there were no representations of Archbishop Carroll visible on the campus of the school he founded until 1912, when a sculpture by Irish artist Jerome Connor was unveiled at Georgetown on May 4, in a ceremony attended by thousands. The project was financed by donations collected by the Alumni Society.
The following sources will provide information about the statue, especially its planning and unveiling. Request them for use in the Booth Family Center via the Aeon request system.
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John Carroll Statue Reference File
University Archives staff maintain reference files on a variety of subjects related to Georgetown University history, including the Carroll statue. These files contain photocopies of newspaper and magazine articles, brochures, and other documents found in the University Archives collection. They are intended to provide a starting point for research rather than to offer exhaustive coverage of any subject but they can often provide the answers to basic informational questions.
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Articles in the Georgetown College Journal, May 1912
The May 1912 issue of the Georgetown College Journal, the first printed newspaper produced by Georgetown students, is devoted to the unveiling of the Carroll statue. This issue includes the text of several speeches delivered at the unveiling ceremony. Other mentions of the statue are found throughout the Journal .
Physical volumes are available for use in the Booth Family Center for Special Collections. There is no overall index to their content. Request them via the Aeon request system. Digitized issues from 1872 to 1920 can be browsed and searched via DigitalGeorgetown. The Date Created facet in blue on the right side of the screen (scroll down to see it) can be used to limit to a particular time period. To search for the reference(s) to the Carroll statue within any issue which appears on a list of search results: click on the title in blue, then click on the blue ViewOpen link at the top of the screen, then hold down the control and f keys on the keyboard at the same time, and enter a search term in the box which appears in the top right corner.
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Two blog posts written by University Archives staff discuss aspects of the statue’s history:
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Photographs
The University Archives has two main photographic collections which include photographs of the Carroll statue see below. Please note that researchers will be given gloves when they are handling photographic materials.
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University Archives Photographic Collection (30 lf). Most of these images date from before 1970; the earliest dates to ca. 1849. Most are black and white photographic prints. No inventory is available but this collection contains multiple folders of images of the Carroll statue. Researchers should request images by folder name (Carroll Statue) and Archives staff will pull folders for them to work with.
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University Photographer’s files (62 lf). Images date from 1956-2004. Most are in the form of black and white negatives, some with accompanying contact sheets. Some photographic prints are also present. Included are shots of campus buildings, events, and people (faculty, staff, students, and visitors). A partial inventory is available for images taken between 1988 and 2004. These can be requested using the box and folder numbers which can be found by clicking the folder description links in the Collection organization pane to the right of the inventory screen (you may have to scroll down to see the pane.) The folder descriptions display with a box and folder number in green font to the left side of the screen. For pre-1988 images, researchers should submit requests by folder name (Carroll Statue) and Archives staff will pull folders for them.
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Old Archives: John Carroll Statue, GTA.000681. 0.5 linear feet
This collection, consisting of one box, contains materials (correspondence, clippings, etc.) from 1889-ca. 1967.
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Georgetown College Financial Records: Vault Collection I.AA.1.l, General Ledger, 1865 - 1927
This ledger includes accounts relating to funding the statue.
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Jerome Connor (1874-1943). Archbishop John Carroll (1735-1815). Bronze on marble base. Library purchase, 2007
Housed in the University Art Collection, this bronze maquette (a sculptor's small preliminary model) for the John Carroll statue in Healy Circle was cast from a terra cotta model made by Connor prior to his final design.
