Thursday, August 12, 2010

Toripolliisi (The Bobby at Market Place) - Oulu, Finland

Many of you already know that my postman prefers to stop by twice or three times a week instaed of coming everyday to drop my mail. Yesterday there were around 20 postcards in my mail box. 8 of them was for "Winner of the Month", some officials and some for round robins. Both of the cards below came yesterday. The first one was for the winner of the month and the second one was an official (FI-864281).

Dear Suvi (nediam_nori) in the forums sent me this cute statue of the Bobby. This bronze statue is in Oulu Market Place in Finland. It was made by sculptor Kaarlo Mikkonen and it is his only public monument. In 1985 a collection was started among the citizens of Oulu to raise money to put up the sculpture. The process was followed in the local papers. The collection was speeded up with a campaign of challenges as well as with selling miniature statues, post cards, and Antell´s Bobby-figured cookies. The bronze Bobby at the Market square was inaugurated in December 1987.
The name of the work refers to three Bobbies that used to work at the Market square in 1934-1979 to maintain discipline and order in the area.

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