Speaking of Lincoln, has his statue been found yet?

May 6—Dear Answer Man: Several years ago there was a recurring discussion in your column about missing statues of our founding fathers that had been damaged, taken down and stored by the city, and then disappeared. There was a rumor that they had been buried near the former YMCA. I have been hoping to hear word of their discovery with the new construction at that location. Are you able to find out if the excavations revealed anything interesting? — Interested Neighbor.

Dear Neighbor,

Well, Saturday's column was all about the missing Lincoln car dealership. Today, we'll talk about Lincoln's (and, apparently, Washington's) missing statues.

For those of you not up to date on local lore surrounding missing statues, here's the background.

According to John Hunziker — retired Rochester teacher, City Council member, City Council president and History Center of Olmsted County worker — two statues, one each of President Abraham Lincoln and President George Washington, went missing around 1958.

The statues had been the highlights of a place called Statuary Park, which was located essentially where the Rochester Public Library now stands . But in the 1950s, Hunziker said — and he's sifted through years of City Council and Park Board minutes from that time — the city decided in order to create more parking spaces for downtown businesses to pave this bit of paradise and put up a parking lot. (Side note: Joni Mitchell "Big Yellow Taxi" is one of the greatest pop-folk songs of all time.)

The statues were moved into storage with the intent of eventually donating them to two Rochester schools that bore the names of those presidents.

And the statues, Hunziker said, were never seen again.

Hunziker said a city employee from those days by the name of Dale Corfits told him, "John they never showed up at either school."

Were they stolen? Crushed up to make the cement of that parking lot? Beamed up by space aliens?

Nope.

Hunziker, who said he's heard this from two independent sources, believes the statues were stored in garages located near Soldiers Field Park next to the site where the YMCA was later built. Those garages were used to store equipment and materials for growing flowers for the parks. Anyway, the rumor is that someone backed a tractor into the statues, breaking them beyond repair. The statues were then buried at the site, never to be seen again.

That's two 6-foot statues made of something called Carrara marble (soft, white marble) with massive stone plinths on which they were displayed.

That's a lot of fancy marble buried out there.

"They put them in a buffalo wallow and covered them up," Hunziker said, recounting what he has heard.

So, Neighbor, it seems you've heard the same rumors.

Today, that downtown parking lot from the 1950s is now the Rochester Public Library. The YMCA, which was built around 1964, has come and gone. In its place, Enclave, a real estate investment firm based out of West Fargo, North Dakota, and Brooklyn Park, Minnesota, is building a $5.9 million, seven-story, 219-unit apartment building .

Patrick Brama, developer with Enclave, said his company uses in-house construction teams and, with him meeting frequently with the people who were digging in the ground, he's pretty sure if someone had unearthed marble statues — either intact or busted — he'd have heard about it.

"It would have been pretty amazing to find that, but no," Brama said. He added that the soil and excavation work at the site is completed, so if they were going to find buried statue treasure, they'd have done so by now.

Hunziker said with construction happening, it would have been the perfect time to discover the statues and end this Med City mystery. Sadly that has not happened.

Brama added if someone wants to bring in ground-penetrating radar and look for the statues — a suggestion made by Hunziker — he'd be happy to be a good community partner, but it'll need to wait until the rest of the construction project is completed.

So, what happens if, someday, the place where Lincoln and Washington — well, their marble likenesses — have been buried is discovered? Hunziker said it's not likely those statues can be dusted off and put on display. Sixty years or so in the ground is a long time for Carrara marble. Those pieces of statue, even if they could be re-assembled, have been stained badly in the ground.

Still, solving the mystery would be nice.

"I believe that's where they're buried," Hunziker said. "Others believe it. But no one has been able to prove it."

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