Art: Instant Stonehenge

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"We must be on our guard," warned Pennsylvania's Republican Senator Hugh Scott some months ago, "lest the nation's capital come to resemble an unplanned cemetery." He may have been more prophetic than he knew. Last week the capital was mulling over a design picked by a national jury— for a memorial to Franklin Delano Roosevelt—eight soaring concrete and marble tablets that at once reminded some viewers of a collection of tombstones. "Instant Stonehenge," the Washington Post called it.

The design sculptor is 32-year-old Norman Hoberman, who worked with a team from the Manhattan architectural firm of Pedersen & Tilney. Hoberman rejected the idea of any kind of statue, because "there is so much photographic material on F.D.R." Nor did he want another anachronism such as a modified Greek temple (the Lincoln Memorial) or an Egyptian obelisk (the Washington Monument). Instead, he proposed perpendicular tablets carrying quotations from Roosevelt. Commented Jury Chairman Pietro Belluschi: "I hate to bring up Moses and his tablets, but this is a sort of version of them."

The $4,300,000 memorial must still be considered by four separate commissions and Congress—not to mention the U.S. public, from whom most of the money must be raised by subscription. Said Congressman James Roosevelt: "I'm afraid I'd have to live with this a long time before I could enjoy it."