The Poprad Lenin Statue
It might seem strange that a 16-foot tall statue of Vladimir Lenin adorns a street corner in Seattle's Fremont neighborhood, but then again, it is Fremont after all.
This impressive bronze monument did not begin it's life in Washington but rather half-away around the globe in what is now Slovakia. In 1988 the Soviet-backed government of Czecholslovakia commissioned Bulgarian sculptor Emil Venkov to create a new centerpiece for Lenin Square in the city of Poprad. Venkov strayed from conventional portrayals of Lenin as a philosopher and intellectual and instead sculpted him as a violent revolutionary surrounded by flames and guns.
The local government installed the sculpture but the tides of change soon swept through the region during the Velvet Revolution of 1989. Officials quietly removed the statue and hid it away in a local scrap yard. In 1993, American English teacher named Lewis Carpenter discovered the discarded statue while living and working in Poprad. After negotiating with the city government, Carpenter purchased the statue and shipped it back to his home in Issaquah, Washington.
Tragically, Carpenter died shortly after returning to the United States and his family began looking for a buyer for the colossal bronze sculpture. A local brass foundry offered to move the statue off of the family's property and relocated it first to the corner of N 34th St & Evanston Ave in the Fremont neighborhood and eventually to its current home at the intersection of Evanston Ave N, N 36th St, and Fremont Place in 1995.
Although the statue has been a constant source of controversy since its installation, the residents of Fremont have adopted it as their own, decorating it for holidays and events and accepting it into their already eclectic neighborhood.
