page_title: Bell Memorial
section_title: Reception
hierarchical_section_title: Bell Memorial / Reception
caption_attribution_description: English: The Bell Telephone Memorial, Alexander Graham Bell Park, Brantford, Ontario, Canada. Created by Canadian sculptor Walter Seymour Allward between 1908 and 1917, and unveiled by the Governor General of Canada before the inventor and scientist, distinguished guests and an audience in the thousands.
context_page_description: The Bell Memorial is a memorial designed by Walter Seymour Allward to commemorate the invention of the telephone by Alexander Graham Bell at the Bell Homestead National Historic Site, in Brantford, Ontario, Canada.
  In 1906, the citizens of the Brantford and Brant County areas formed the Bell Telephone Memorial Association, which commissioned the memorial. By 1908, the association's designs committee asked sculptors on two continents to submit proposals for the memorial. The submission by Canadian sculptor Walter Seymour Allward of Toronto won the competition. The memorial was originally scheduled for completion by 1912 but Allward, aided by his studio assistant Emanuel Hahn did not finish it until five years later. The Governor General of Canada, Victor Cavendish, 9th Duke of Devonshire, unveiled the memorial on 24 October 1917.
  Allward designed the monument to symbolize the telephone's ability to overcome great distances.
context_section_description: Allward's memorial has been described as "a tour de force".  One resident described the imagery of the oversized figures on its bronze panel, saying that it  "...depicts a mythical passing of the spark of communication from the hands of the gods to the hands of humans". The memorial has served as an important gathering point, landmark and commemoration site for Brantford, used to rally people for fund-raising events, marches and civic events. At the Armistice of World War I, it became a spontaneous gathering point for celebration. It was also used to help raise funds for Brantford's First World War Cenotaph, another of Walter Allward's works.
  The memorial received historical designation for its cultural heritage value, by the City of Brantford on 31 October 2005, under the Ontario Heritage Act. It was also designated and listed on the Canadian Register of Historic Places on 12 January 2009. In 2010 both Parks Canada and the Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada celebrated Allward's work by affixing a plaque to the monument honouring the sculptor himself.  It noted Allward's designation as a person of national historic significance due to his "...original sense of spatial composition, his mastery of the classical form and his brilliant craftsmanship."
caption: Historic Sites and Monuments Board of Canada plaque added in 2010 honouring Allward's work.
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