{"id":717768,"date":"2026-06-21T17:54:40","date_gmt":"2026-06-21T17:54:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/717768\/"},"modified":"2026-06-21T17:54:40","modified_gmt":"2026-06-21T17:54:40","slug":"big-annie-statue-project-reaches-fundraising-goal-sets-unveiling-date","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/717768\/","title":{"rendered":"Big Annie Statue project reaches fundraising goal, sets unveiling date"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">CALUMET, Mich. (WLUC) &#8211; A project nearly four years in the making has finally set the date for its completion. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The Big Annie Statue project has announced that it has reached its goal of $150,000. The project has aimed to create and erect a statue of \u2018Big Annie\u2019 Clemenc, a labor activist and leader in the 1913 Copper Strike. This has been a collaborative effort between the project committee and the Keweenaw Community Foundation. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cMy team has been unwavering on fundraising for this, and that\u2019s how we got it done in three and a half years,\u201d Big Annie Statue Project Committee Chair Vada Riederich said. \u201cWe still have people who want to donate money, but we can\u2019t. We\u2019re done fundraising&#8230; I\u2019m very grateful to all the people who have donated to this and have dedicated their time and talent.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Riederich says that not only has the statue arrived in the area, but Aug. 22 has also been set as its unveiling date. A celebration is planned from 3 p.m. to 5:30 p.m. to coincide with the statue\u2019s unveiling and dedication <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/2025\/11\/14\/village-calumet-selects-location-20th-century-labor-leader-statue\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/2025\/11\/14\/village-calumet-selects-location-20th-century-labor-leader-statue\/\">at Calumet\u2019s Greenspace Park<\/a>, right next to the Calumet Theatre. A parade, free ice cream and live music are some of the event\u2019s features. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cWe have quite an event planned,\u201d Riederich continued. \u201cWe have two authors&#8230; Lyndon Comstock, author of Annie Clemenc and the Great Keweenaw Copper Strike, is coming from California. And we also have Mary Doria Russell, who wrote The Women of the Copper Country. She will also be there. They\u2019ll be doing a book signing in the morning at Copper World. We just learned that.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Riederich says that you can also join in on the celebrations\u2019 parade. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIf they want to dress in costumes, mining outfits or themes or anything like that\u2026 [you] should contact Terra West,\u201d Riederich added. \u201cShe\u2019s with our committee. Contact anyone on the committee, and they\u2019ll put you in touch with her.\u201d <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">You can reach out to the committee through its <a href=\"https:\/\/www.biganniestatue.com\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.biganniestatue.com\/\">homepage<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigAnnieStatueProject#\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BigAnnieStatueProject#\">Facebook page<\/a>. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Riederich notes that a donor reception will also be held in the Calumet Theatre\u2019s ballroom after the unveiling. She encourages all donors of the project to attend but says that they will need to RSVP ahead of time due to limited space. She also says they can do this by reaching out to the Keweenaw Community Foundation. <\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">The video above will feature the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/livestream\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/livestream\/\" target=\"_blank\">TV6 livestream<\/a> until staff can clip the corresponding story, if available, from broadcasts or other TV6 content. You can subscribe to our <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@wluc\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/@wluc\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube page<\/a> or <a href=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/page\/tv6-plus\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.uppermichiganssource.com\/page\/tv6-plus\/\" target=\"_blank\">download TV6+<\/a> to stream the latest local news and weather.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 WLUC. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"CALUMET, Mich. (WLUC) &#8211; A project nearly four years in the making has finally set the date for&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":717769,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[158473,123161,228,226,227,1979,309177,8099,309176,1075,229,40288,88,6380,58099,70505,1929,5474,82976,1744,26018],"class_list":["post-717768","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-activist","tag-annie","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-big","tag-calumet","tag-celebration","tag-clemenc","tag-community","tag-design","tag-donate","tag-entertainment","tag-foundation","tag-fundraise","tag-keweenaw","tag-labor","tag-mining","tag-parade","tag-project","tag-statue"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717768","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=717768"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/717768\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/717769"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=717768"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=717768"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=717768"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}