A miniature replica of the Statue of Liberty arrived in New Jersey after a week-long voyage from France on Wednesday morning and will be set up at Ellis Island for Independence Day.
The 10-foot, 1,000-pound statue has been on display at Paris's Musée des Arts et Métiers for the last 10 years, but was shipped to America under a joint effort by the Embassy of France in the United States, the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers and the shipping company CMA CGM Group.
"The arrival of the new Lady Liberty will celebrate the most central value of the French-American partnership: freedom," the French Embassy said this month.
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The statue was being offloaded in New Jersey on Wednesday morning at a ceremony attended by New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy, French Ambassador Philippe Etienne, Port Authority of New York & New Jersey Chairman Kevin O’Toole, and CMA CGM and APL North America President Ed Aldridge.
"We are very, very proud to transport this statue," Aldridge told Fox News. "This project not only stands for great values — the great values of freedom, liberty, and friendship — the project also showcases the group’s capabilities to design and deliver complex, supply end-to-end solutions by delivering this unique statue, this precious piece of art here to the U.S."
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It will now go on display at Ellis Island, the site that 12 million immigrants passed through from 1892 to 1954, through the July 4 celebrations. Ellis Island is three-quarters of a mile from Liberty Island, where the original Statue of Liberty was put on display 135 years ago.
From there, it will debut in the garden of the French ambassador’s residence in Washington, D.C. on July 14, which is Bastille Day in France and celebrates the French Revolution.