Oklahoma Land Run Monument

The largest free-standing bronze sculpture in the world, by Oklahoman artist Paul Moore — forty-five life-sized figures of horses, wagons, settlers and children racing for claims in the 1889 Land Run, spread out along a 100-metre stretch of the Bricktown Canal. The piece took twenty years to complete and was finished in 2015.

The sculpture is best read by walking the whole length, starting at the southern end where the riders are just gathering and ending where they crash forward into the canal itself. The setting on the water, with the bronzes seeming to gallop into the air above it, is theatrical in the best sense. Free; visible 24 hours.

things to do sight bricktown canal
A story
The Land Run of 22 April 1889 — the original event the monument depicts — opened two million acres of former Indian Territory to white settlement at the firing of a single shot at noon. By the end of the day Oklahoma City did not exist; by sundown it had a population of 10,000 people living in tents along the new railroad tracks. The 'Sooners' nicknamed in the state seal were settlers who jumped the gun and staked claims before the noon shot.

Other places in Bricktown Canal