Louisiana Purchase Exposition Silver Medal
Adolph Alexander Weinman American, born Germany
Not on view
The Louisiana Purchase Exposition, held in St. Louis in 1904, commemorated the centennial of the Louisiana Purchase in which the United States acquired vast territory west of the Mississippi River from France. This medal was one of several variants that Weinman created for the fair, the shape depending on the type of the award. William James Glackens, a prominent Ashcan School painter was awarded this Silver Medal for his painting Ballet Girl in Pink. The obverse of this square medal depicts an allegorical female in a classicizing gown sheltering a semi-nude Native American woman under an outspread American flag, personifications of Columbia and the Louisiana Territory respectively. The reverse shows an eagle with outspread wings gripping oak and laurel leaves in its talons. Two dolphins flank an inverted scallop shell and the sides and lower edge of the tablet.
