Researched by: Avi Alaev

Upon seeing this sculpture, my attention was immediately locked: why was a dog memorialized in Central Park? My confusion, however, was clouded by my adoration of how cute the dog looked and the intensive urge I had to pet him (yes, I’m aware he’s inanimate). After those feelings subsided, I decided this would be the perfect, and most fun, object to analyze in the park.

While researching the story behind the dog, I found that the story began in 1925, when a diphtheria outbreak almost wiped out the child population of Nome, a remote area of Alaska. The closest cure to the disease was located 700 miles away in Anchorage. To deliver the medicine and save Nome, Balto, a Siberian husky, led a sled team of dogs during an extremely harsh, blinding snowstorm where temperature dropped below -50 F. This journey was extremely time-sensitive and treacherous, yet Balto led the dogs to Nome in a mere 5 days as the world followed their journey through the news. In December of that year, a group of NYC artists fundraised and created the sculpture in Central Park to commemorate Balto and he was actually present for his statue’s unveiling; he is the only one to have ever attended the unveiling of his own statue (Sain-Baird 2018). Last year, the University of California Santa Cruz conducted a research project where they compared Balto’s genome to that of hundreds of other dog breeds to determine what genetic factors contributed to his resilience. In the study, they found that he had no genetic markers indicating he was part wolf, which many people hypothesized, and his genetic makeup was extremely diverse (Stephens 2023).

Balto represents a main quality that Olmsted wanted Central Park to have: unifying the cultures of an extremely diverse city. Since Olmsted was concerned about the varying lifestyles and perspectives that immigrants brought to NYC, he wanted Central Park to stand as a place for unity and assimilation to an American, or at least a New York, identity. Additionally, he wanted the park to have a “light-hearted,” “positive,” and “inclusive” atmosphere (America’s Greatest Public Space). Through radio stations and newspapers, Balto was seen as a heroic figure by the masses and sparked conversation throughout the nation. What better way to achieve Olmsted’s mission than to erect a monument of a figure that everyone acknowledges as an unproblematic hero that humans are biologically hardwired to love? The answer is simple: there isn’t one.