PLANNING consent has been lodged for a statue in Lyme Regis to pay tribute to fossil hunter Mary Anning.
The application, from the charity Mary Anning Rocks, has just been submitted for a small area at the eastern end of Long Entry. It comes after problems with an attempt to have the statue erected near the Marine Theatre.
It is hoped to unveil the statue on May 21, 2022, exactly 223 years after Mary Anning’s birth.
The statue depicts Anning and her dog, Tray.
The application comes after a campaign by Evie Swire who has set about fund-raising with her mother, Anya Pearson, for a statue to Anning after realising that the resort had no statue to mark her history. The campaign has raised around £100,000.
When Evie started her campaign in 2018 she was 10 years old.
Her mother says: “It’s my daughter’s indignation and anger that sparked this campaign” after being surprised and frustrated there was no tribute to Mary Anning.
The proposal has already won support from Dorchester artist Michal Taylor, a member of the Royal Society of Portrait Painters, who says a statue is long overdue.
In his letter to Dorset Council, which will decide the application, he says: “As a regular visitor to Lyme I consider the sculpture to be a sensitive and appropriate representation of someone who gave so much to science and the region and I support it one hundred percent.”
Early support has also come from local professional fossil collector Brandon Lennon who has also written to support the proposal.
The application papers from agents Terence O’Rourke Ltd, says despite coming from a poor background Anning’s finds changed the way scientists thought about the origins of our planet and how life evolved on it.
“Throughout Mary Anning’s lifetime, her achievements have largely gone unacknowledged with her name having been eradicated from the historic archives due to her being an uneducated, working-class woman and an outsider to the polite and scientific community,” with her discoveries often attributed to the male geologists she collected for.
The proposed statue will be in bronze and will be placed, subject to consent, overlooking Black Ven where many of her finds came from.
The site is on the junction of Long Entry and the footpath at Church Cliffs which connects to the end of the promenade, from Cobb Gate, along Gun Cliff.
The proposal seeks to place the life-size statue, by Denise Dutton, on cobbles to the east of the grass bank.
The application, ref 2021/04897, can be seen on the Dorset Council website and remains open for public comment until Christmas Eve.
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