Doughboy rededicated 75 years after dedication

NEW ULM — Nearly 75 years to the day after the dedication of the original statue, New Ulm veterans, city officials and Brown County Historical Society members rededicated the “Spirit of the American Doughboy Statue” that has stood in the New Ulm City Cemetery Soldier’s Rest section.

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The Doughboy, with a rifle in one hand and a hand grenade raised in the other, was designed to represent the grim realities of war that the average American soldier endured in World War I, Mayor Robert Beussman said. The designer, Ernest Moore Viquesney, didn’t want his statue to glorify warfare.

The statue is one of many created from Viquesney’s original designs across the nation, but it is the only one in Minnesota.