The Lion Watches Over Readers

In front of the Westminster branch of the Carroll County Public Library is a sculpture of a boy leaning against a lion while reading. The sculpture is called Wild Imaginings.

Walter’s bronze sculpture is a nod to the importance of books in the lives of children; books that fire and support imagination. For Walter, books were part of imagining a world beyond his own, an idea that he then captured in sculpture.

Donations to Carroll County Public Library covered the cost of the sculpture that is now a landmark in downtown Westminster. Every winter, the lion gets a scarf. Children love to touch the lion. Parents want to get pictures with the lion.

Lory and I recently did an interview with Patti Callahan on her book Once Upon a Wardrobe. The Westminster lion isn’t Aslan, but….

Walter sculpts in clay, huge amounts of clay that are then cast in bronze. Lynn Wheeler, the then Director of CCPL, took me on a trip to the foundry in Baltimore where the sculpture was being cast. It was fascinating seeing the process and what sticks with me the most was touching the tail; a piece separate from the rest of the sculpture. If you go to the Book People section of the Two Sides website you will see a picture of Lynn and the lion. They belong together.

The tail might be the most comfortable connection between people and the lion. Somehow, it feels safe touching the lion’s tail. Maybe wildness and imagination and reading come together in the tail. The shine from repeated touching might be evidence of the connection.

Maybe I’m putting too much on a sculpture, but to me it feels good to have Bart’s lion, our lion watching over our library, our young readers, and our imagination.