Bison statues cast in bronze are on permanent display outside the Smithsonian's ɫtv Museum of Natural History, Friday, March 20, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)
Bison statues cast in bronze are on permanent display outside the Smithsonian's ɫtv Museum of Natural History, Friday, March 20, 2026, in Washington. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)
Paleoartist Gary Staab stands next to one of the clay sculptures of bison statues he crafted at his studio in Kearney, Mo., on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Nick Ingram)
Paleoartist Gary Staab holds a small-scale prototype of a bison sculpture while standing next to the full-size clay sculpture he crafted at his studio in Kearney, Mo., on Tuesday, Dec. 2, 2025. (AP Photo/Nick Ingram)
Bison statues cast in bronze are on permanent display outside the Smithsonian's ɫtv Museum of Natural History, Friday, March 20, 2026, in Washington. The Washington Monument is in the background. (AP Photo/Rahmat Gul)
KEARNEY, Mo. (AP) — The national mammal of the United States is getting in on America's 250th birthday celebration.
Three bison statues cast in bronze have taken up a permanent display outside the Smithsonian’s ɫtv Museum of Natural History in Washington. The pieces — which are larger than real-life bison — made their public debut in the nation's capital on Friday.
The bison as the nation's mammal under a law signed by former President Obama in 2016. Millions of bison once roamed the Great Plains but were nearly driven to extinction in the 1800s.
“It’s a wonderful story of conservation working, it’s a story of people seeing a need and getting behind that to conserve an animal that is specific to North America,” said Gary Staab, a paleoartist who made the statues.
Staab designed and sculpted the statues in Kearney, Missouri, where he works full-time to create sculptures of animals and historical artifacts for museums around the world. For the bison, Staab sculpted the full-size statues in foam and clay before they were cast in bronze and assembled at a foundry in Colorado. The three statues depict a bull, a cow and a calf.
He said it took about four months to complete the sculptures — a time frame he called “lighting fast” given the size of the pieces.
“They really represent a really unbelievably beautiful and unique thing about North America,” Staab said.
The Associated Press
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