A local group has saved Pershing Center’s mural from destruction. Through the efforts of the Committee to Save the Pershing Mural, the iconic artwork will not lie among the rubble of the auditorium when it’s demolished later this year.
The 38-foot tall, 148-foot-wide mural is made up of 766,000 one-inch ceramic tiles and was removed in segments. It adorned the facade of the Pershing Center since the auditorium opened in 1957.
Liz Shea-McCoy, the committee Chair, told KLIN News that the group worked with Lincoln to raise one million dollars by a mid-May deadline. That amount was reached two weeks early and was used to safely remove the mural.
“We’re trying,” said Shea-McCoy, “to work again with the city of Lincoln on finding the best possible site for the re-installation of the mural on a free-standing structure with a plaza in front of it for seating to enable teachers to take their students there to study the mural, for inspiration in the performing arts, visual arts, all forms of poetry… It’s quite an amazing piece of art.”
The committee now needs to raise two million more dollars for the mural’s re-installation and depends on contributions from individuals and entities such as the Acklie Charitable Foundation for required funds. Tax deductible donations can be made online or by mailing the Nebraska State Historical Society Foundation by noting Pershing Mural Preservation Project in the “memo” line of the check.