Count Rumford Statue

Over the course of his storied life, Woburn native and loyalist Benjamin Thompson (1754-1814) accumulated an impressively wide range of titles, accolades, and professional experiences. Thompson was a physicist, engineer, businessman, humanitarian, bureaucrat, statesman, count of the Holy Roman Empire, officer in the King’s American Dragoons, and possibly even a spy for the British during the Revolutionary War.

A statue bearing his likeness stands atop a granite base outside Woburn Public Library, facing Pleasant Street. It is an exact replica of another statue by sculptor Caspar Zumbusch that stands in Munich, Germany. The Munich statue was commissioned by the King of Bavaria in 1867 as a gesture of gratitude to Thompson, who was designated "Count Rumford" in 1791 for his services in Bavaria. It was in Munich that Rumford conducted his most important scientific works, and where he designed the Englischer Garten, one of the world’s largest urban public parks.

Woburn’s statue to Count Rumford was supported by a donation from resident Marshall Tidd and cost approximately $6,000. Dedicated in 1900, the inscription on the plaque on the base’s northeastern face was written by President Charles W. Eliot of Harvard College and reads:

BENJAMIN THOMPSON
COUNT RUMFORD
BORN IN WOBURN MAR 26 1753
DIED IN PARIS AUG 21 1814

THE EARLIEST
SCIENTIFIC PHILANTHROPIST

HE DESIGNED PUBLIC GARDENS
AND BY MANY INVENTIONS
CONTRIBUTED TO THE COMFORTS
AND ENJOYMENTS
OF THE PEOPLE

HE PROVED THAT HEAT IS MOTION
AND HAD A GLIMPSE
OF THE GREAT DOCTRINE
KNOWN LATER AS
THE CONSERVATION OF ENERGY

IN EXILE
HE WON HIGH PLACES
OF TRUST AND COMMAND

On the other side a plaque reads:

THIS STATUE
BY
CASPAR ZUMBUSCH
A REPLICA OF THE ONE IN MUNICH
GERMANY
WAS GIVEN TO THE WOBURN PUBLIC LIBRARY
BY
MARSHALL TIDD
1899

According to the article, “Statue Inspected: New Site Perhaps for Count Rumford in Woburn,” in the February 11, 1900 edition of the Boston Herald, not everyone was pleased with the statue’s prominent location in front of the Woburn Public Library, a magnificent building designed by noted American architect Henry Hobson Richardson. While a committee was formed to inspect the statue and determine if it detracted from the building’s facade and should be relocated to Rumford’s birthplace on Elm Street, the statue ultimately remained in its original location.