Levi L. Barbour Memorial Fountain

01 / The story of this place

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Levi L. Barbour was a Detroit lawyer and real estate man who had pushed the city to buy Belle Isle, and when he died he left $20,000 for a memorial meant to encourage others to give. The city opened a design competition, 26 sculptors sent in entries, and a young Marshall Fredericks won with a gazelle caught in the middle of a sharp turn. It was his first major public commission. The bronze animal rises high above a round basin on a granite pedestal, and since gazelles never roamed Michigan, Fredericks surrounded it with four carved granite locals: an otter, a grouse, a hawk and a rabbit. The fountain was dedicated on June 25, 1937, in front of the Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory, the island's glass-domed greenhouse. Fredericks went on to give Detroit The Spirit of Detroit in 1958, and casts of his Leaping Gazelle now stand in other American and European cities, but this is the original setting.

1. Dedicated on June 25, 1937, in front of the Belle Isle conservatory
2. Marshall Fredericks' first major commission, chosen from 26 entries
3. The bronze gazelle stands about 16 feet up on a granite pedestal
4. An otter, a grouse, a hawk and a rabbit in granite stand for Michigan wildlife
5. Paid for by a $20,000 bequest from lawyer Levi L. Barbour