{"id":538204,"date":"2026-03-22T07:52:14","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T07:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/538204\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T07:52:14","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T07:52:14","slug":"americas-official-mammal-the-bison-gets-a-bronze-tribute-for-the-countrys-250th-birthday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/538204\/","title":{"rendered":"America&#8217;s Official Mammal, the Bison, Gets a Bronze Tribute for the Country&#8217;s 250th Birthday"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Three bison statues cast in bronze have taken up a permanent display outside the Smithsonian\u2019s National Museum of Natural History in Washington. The pieces \u2014 which are larger than real-life bison \u2014 made their public debut in the nation&#8217;s capital on Friday. <\/p>\n<p>The bison <a href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/united-states-government-5e140d66eb724acabfaae57b0cd95397\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">earned its official status<\/a> as the nation&#8217;s mammal under a law signed by former President Obama in 2016. Millions of bison once roamed the Great Plains but were nearly driven to extinction in the 1800s. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a wonderful story of conservation working, it\u2019s a story of people seeing a need and getting behind that to conserve an animal that is specific to North America,\u201d said Gary Staab, a paleoartist who made the statues. <\/p>\n<p>Staab designed and sculpted the statues in Kearney, Missouri, where he works full-time to create sculptures of animals and historical artifacts for museums around the world. For the bison, Staab sculpted the full-size statues in foam and clay before they were cast in bronze and assembled at a foundry in Colorado. The three statues depict a bull, a cow and a calf. <\/p>\n<p>He said it took about four months to complete the sculptures \u2014 a time frame he called \u201clighting fast\u201d given the size of the pieces. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey really represent a really unbelievably beautiful and unique thing about North America,\u201d Staab said. <\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 The\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.ap.org\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\">Associated Press<\/a>. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.<\/p>\n<p>Photos You Should See \u2013 March 2026<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/march-17-pyss-y01.jpg\" alt=\"An Army carry team moves the flag-draped transfer case containing the remains of U.S. Army soldier Maj. Sorffly Davius, of Cambria Heights, N.Y., who died in Kuwait, during a casualty return, Monday, March 9, 2026, at Dover Air Force Base, Del. (AP Photo\/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)\" class=\"Image__PictureImage-sc-412cjc-1 bBgODV Image-sc-412cjc-2 SlideshowEmbed__Picture-fkpjfn-0 kQDDcT bUlaJL\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Three bison statues cast in bronze have taken up a permanent display outside the Smithsonian\u2019s National Museum of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":538205,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[23,1147,2724,241138,241137,47470,241139,88,6747,241140,3,795,21,19,22,20,25,24,2002],"class_list":["post-538204","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-united-states","tag-america","tag-animals","tag-associated-press","tag-collections-top-news","tag-collections-us","tag-d-c","tag-d-c-news","tag-entertainment","tag-missouri","tag-missouri-news","tag-news","tag-u-s-news","tag-united-states","tag-united-states-of-america","tag-unitedstates","tag-unitedstatesofamerica","tag-us","tag-usa","tag-washington"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538204","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=538204"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/538204\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/538205"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=538204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=538204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=538204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}