Full of confidence upon his return to Berlin, he was determined to achieve success as a free-lance sculptor, participating in several contests for monument and fountain designs. By 1898, he had won three major commissions. In 1899, through his friend Constantin Starck, he met Duke John Albert of Mecklenburg, who liked his work and placed several orders. His career truly took off after that point and the years 1897 to 1916 proved to be his most successful. Buoyed by the positive reception he received at the St.Louis World's Fair in 1904, he entered competitions for monuments in places as diverse as Manila, Cape Town and Quito, but to no avail. He finally received an order for a monument to Michael Andreas Barclay de Tolly in Riga and was proffered an invitation to compete for a monument in St.Louis that would be dedicated to the German-American journalists Carl Schurz, Emil Preetorius and Carl Daenzer.