The Spirit of Detroit is a city monument with a large bronze statue created by Marshall Fredericks

Marshall Fredericks

Marshall Maynard Fredericks was an American sculptor.-Biography:Fredericks was born of Scandinavian heritage in Rock Island, Illinois on January 31, 1908. His family moved to Florida for a short time and then settled in Cleveland, Ohio, where he grew up...

 and located at the Coleman A. Young

Coleman Young

Coleman Alexander Young served as mayor of Detroit in the U.S. state of Michigan from 1974 to 1993. Young became the first African-American mayor of Detroit in the same week that Maynard Jackson became the first African-American mayor of Atlanta.-Pre-Mayoral career:Young was born in Tuscaloosa,...

 Municipal Center

Coleman A. Young Municipal Center

The Coleman A. Young Municipal Center is a class-A office building in downtown Detroit, near Hart Plaza, One Detroit Center and the Renaissance Center. Originally called the City-County Building, it was renamed for former Detroit Mayor Coleman A. Young, shortly after his death in 1997...

 on Woodward Avenue in Detroit

Detroit, Michigan

Detroit is the major city among the primary cultural, financial, and transportation centers in the Metro Detroit area, a region of 5.2 million people. As the seat of Wayne County, the city of Detroit is the largest city in the U.S. state of Michigan and serves as a major port on the Detroit River...

, Michigan

Michigan

Michigan is a U.S. state located in the Great Lakes Region of the United States of America. The name Michigan is the French form of the Ojibwa word mishigamaa, meaning "large water" or "large lake"....

, USA

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

.

It was commissioned in 1955 for a cost of $58,000, and dedicated in 1958.
In its left hand, the large seated figure holds a gilt bronze

Bronze

Bronze is a metal alloy consisting primarily of copper, usually with tin as the main additive. It is hard and brittle, and it was particularly significant in antiquity, so much so that the Bronze Age was named after the metal...

 sphere emanating rays to symbolize God

God

God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....

. In its right hand, is a family group symbolizing all human relationships. The 26-foot (7.9 m) sculpture was the largest cast bronze statue since the Renaissance

Renaissance

The Renaissance was a cultural movement that spanned roughly the 14th to the 17th century, beginning in Italy in the Late Middle Ages and later spreading to the rest of Europe. The term is also used more loosely to refer to the historical era, but since the changes of the Renaissance were not...

 when it was first installed.
It was cast in Oslo, Norway.

The statue underwent a restoration , funded by foundations and other private donations.

Name

The sculpture was not actually named.
Nevertheless, it bears an inscription from 2 Corinthians (3:17) on the wall behind it:

"NOW THE LORD IS THAT SPIRIT

AND WHERE THE SPIRIT OF THE

LORD IS, THERE IS LIBERTY."

II CORINTHIANS 3:17

It also includes the seals of the city and the county. A plaque in front of the sculpture bears the inscription, "The artist expresses the concept that God, through the spirit of man is manifested in the family, the noblest human relationship."

Uses of the Spirit of Detroit as a community symbol

• The statue is frequently dressed in sports jerseys when local professional teams
  Sports in Detroit
  Detroit, Michigan is home to four professional American sports teams. It is a important sports center as one of twelve cities in the United States to have teams from the four major North American sports....
  
   are in the playoffs. It was also once dressed in a tuxedo during a visit by the Three Tenors. For the first time since 1997, the statue did not wear a Detroit Red Wings sweater during their Stanley Cup Finals victory in 2008 due to the ongoing restoration. Instead, a large statue of a Tiger at Comerica Park
  Comerica Park
  Comerica Park is an open-air ballpark located in downtown Detroit, Michigan. It serves as the home of the Detroit Tigers of Major League Baseball's American League, replacing historic Tiger Stadium in 2000....
  
   was dressed with a jersey.
• In the past, a local wit had painted green (the color of the statue) footprints heading out from the statue and leading to Giacomo Manzù
  Giacomo Manzù
  Giacomo Manzù, pseudonym of Giacomo Manzoni , was an Italian sculptor, communist, and Roman Catholic.-Biography:...
  
  's naked Passo di Danza (Step of the Dance) bronze sculpture nearby .

• As one of Detroit's most easily identifiable landmarks, a sketch of the statue appears as the central element of most of the logos of Detroit's city departments and services.
• An image of the statue appears on the "Spirit of Detroit Award" certificate. This is issued by the Detroit City Council to a person, event or organization being honored for an outstanding achievement or service to the citizens of Detroit.
• The Spirit of Detroit is the main image on Detroit Community Scrip
  Detroit Community Scrip
  Detroit Community Scrip, also called Detroit Cheers, is a local currency scrip in Detroit, Michigan. Modeled upon the provincial dollars that were used during the Great Depression, it is being used to restore local economic confidence in a city that has an unemployment rate of 22.2%. The Cheers are...
  
  .