Newsboy Statue

Standing on Main Street, the Newsboy Statue is one of Great Barrington's most charming historical curiosities — a life-sized bronze boy, papers under one arm, mid-shout, erected in 1895. It is believed to be the world's first public monument to a working-class child rather than a historical or political figure.

The statue is part of a broader story about the town's independent, somewhat contrarian streak. Great Barrington was also the birthplace of W.E.B. Du Bois, one of the founders of the NAACP and among the most important civil rights thinkers of the 20th century — a fact the town now commemorates more proudly than it once did.

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When the Newsboy Statue was unveiled in Great Barrington in 1895, it was the first monument in the world dedicated to the anonymous working child — a tribute not to any individual, but to the hundreds of thousands of boys who hawked newspapers on city corners. The statue was commissioned by a local newspaper proprietor; the boy depicted is thought to have been based on a real Great Barrington newsboy.