Artist Eric Jones of Eric Jones Studios will be the featured sand sculptor at the Dunkirk Beach Bash on Saturday, August 19. He will replicate the historical King Neptune fountain statue which originated in Dunkirk at the Brooks Locomotive Co. in 1883, moved to Washington Park in 1938 and eventually placed at his current location at SUNY Fredonia natatorium.

When Dunkirk Beach Bash organizers Ryan Hall, Dunkirk festivals coordinator and Scott Mekus, event specialist, were discussing the Saturday event and what sand sculpture design should be featured, several ideas came to the table.

“Should it be an aquatic animal, something beach-related or a Disney character?” Mekus asked.

“Heck, we could do King Neptune,” chuckled Hall.

“Actually – that’s not a bad idea!” exclaimed Mekus. “We could replicate Dunkirk’s iconic King Neptune statue that was in Washington Park’s fountain right across the street where I grew up.”

With this in mind, artist/sculptor/owner Eric Jones of Eric Jones Studios was hired to create the replica out of sand at Wright Park across from the Beach House Bar & Grille.

“The King Neptune fountain is a beautiful work of art,” Jones said. “It will be very difficult to emulate such ornate craftsmanship in sand, but I’m excited and up for the challenge. “I am looking forward to seeing the smiles on the faces of the folks in this wonderful Western New York community. What a beautiful spot for a sculpture!”

The carving project will take four hours for four days to complete with the final bronze painting and unveiling between 2 and 3 p.m. Saturday. Spectators are welcome but reminded to be considerate of the artist’s limited time to recreate the well-known statue by not interrupting him too much.

There is a long history of the Neptune statue in Dunkirk which needs to be reiterated with special thanks to in the Dunkirk Historical Society and its museum, City Historian Diane Andrasik and volunteer Denise Griggs for their assistance with this story.

Horatio Brooks, founder of the Brooks Locomotive Co. in Dunkirk, built an office building to serve his expanding company and, in 1883, installed a fountain of King Neptune purchased from the J. W. Fiske Co. in front of the building.

It weighed 960 pounds of a zinc composite, stood 7 feet tall, and cost him $500. The company specialized in creating zinc sculpture, making fountains, garden sculpture and benches, memorial statues for fallen heroes for public and private customers.

The fountain Brooks purchased was that of King Neptune resting on rocks and a giant shell, surrounded by sea creatures, and it remained at the original location until 1937.

By that time the Brooks company had merged with other locomotive making plants to create ALCO (the American Locomotive Company), which demolished the office building. The fountain sculpture was offered to the city of Dunkirk, which accepted it.

Dunkirk’s Washington Park, bounded by Park, Washington, Fifth and Sixth streets, was the city’s premier park. It already had a spray fountain in a wide basin, but the city replaced it with the King Neptune fountain in May 1938. The new fountain was popularly received except by someone who complained that the flesh-tone paint made the statue seem risque. The city responded by painting it bronze.

In 1999, local resident and past Dunkirk Historical Society President Robert Harris recalled, “It was a beautiful center piece for many years. No matter where you were, you could see the fountain and the spray. It had a rose garden around the base and there were lights under the water.”

Nevertheless, the fountain suffered from neglect and abuse. Children climbed it. Parts of Neptune himself were broken off, including part of the trident.

Some recalled that, when playing baseball in the park, hitting the statue in the head with the ball was considered an automatic home run.

So by 1967, the 84-year old statue was showing the effects of years of wear and vandalism. The mayor ordered it removed for what some citizens thought would be repair.

As years went by, it languished in storage at the city water works building on Robin Street.

In September 1985, the city council voted unanimously to transfer ownership of the fountain statue to the Dunkirk Historical Society, which hoped to restore it.

The restoration cost proved too great at the time and the statue remained in storage until 1999.

In that year, the Dunkirk Historical Society created the “King Neptune Restoration Project” and joined with the Dunkirk Rotary Club to commence raising $20,000 to restore the statue.

Professor Robert Booth, Chair of the Visual Arts and New Media Department at SUNY Fredonia, agreed to restore King Neptune at the college’s facilities. He had recently completed restoration of the two Mark fountains in Fredonia’s Barker Commons.

Other members of the King Neptune Restoration committee were Professor Robert Booth, Diane Genung, Roger Schulenberg, Mike Sheffield, and Roy Davis. The necessary funds were raised, nearly 25% of which came from residents, social clubs, and businesses.

The statue required a great deal of work: cleaning, repairing major cracks, adding a stabilizing piece inside to support the weight, replacing of all nozzles and pipes, part of the trident and some of the sea creatures.

By August 2001, restoration was complete and King Neptune was returned to Washington Park for an afternoon’s visit.

The Historical Society searched for a permanent location that would be sheltered from the elements, secure from vandalism, highly visible to the community, and operational year-round.

An indoor location for this now historical artifact was considered essential. The search for a location proved both difficult and politically fraught for the Historical Society.

In the short term, SUNY Fredonia College President Dennis Hefner offered to display the statue in the new Steele Hall, which houses the college’s natatorium. In late 2001, Neptune, on loan from the Dunkirk Historical Society by written agreement, went on display in the lobby of that building and is still stationed there for public viewing.

The Historical Society explored placing the statue in Dunkirk’s Boardwalk Market near the city pier, but no space was available. When the public library addition was planned, a request to make space in the lobby was rejected for lack of funds.

Lack of funds also doomed placement in the never built Lake Erie Heritage Center, as well as the incubator project which SUNY Fredonia located in the city of Dunkirk. The mayor of Dunkirk wanted to install the statue outside City Hall, but it was an outdoor location.

Some suggested that it be placed near Dunkirk High School’s new pool, but that did not meet the criteria for security or community visibility.

City Historian Andrasik points out that “The King Neptune fountain represents the city’s connection with the lake and with the railroad, as the existence of both in Dunkirk insured the city’s early success. The artist (Jones) choosing to render that fountain in an artful way at the city-sponsored event, will hopefully remind our citizens of that historical connection.”

Jones is a WNY native from West Clarksville and continues to practice his profession only a few miles from his hometown today. Now a world-renowned artist, Eric started an online retail caricature and avatar illustration business in 2005, which quickly became the largest of its kind on the web. He still owns this company today, employing artists from all over the world.

Other Beach Bash events, sponsored by National Grid, DFT Communications, Chautauqua Nursing & Rehabilitation Center and Southern Chautauqua Federal Credit Union, include kickball, mush ball, pickleball and volleyball tournaments; live music by Kokomo Time Band, Pedro and the Smooth Cats, KISS THIS!, beach deejay Joe Gould, craft/gift and food vendors, children’s entertainer Marty Bubblegum’s Machine, inflatable bounce houses, dunk tank, chalk art/sand building/water balloon toss contests and “The Mummy” movie at dusk.

Wright Park Beach will be accessible with lifeguards from noon to 7 p.m. The splash pad, playground, basketball courts, skate park and Beach House Bar & Grille will also be open to the public.

For more information or to be an event vendor, contact Ryan Hall at City of Dunkirk at (716) 366-9886 or rhall@cityofdunkirk.com.