More Statue of Liberty Facts

According to designer Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi, the sculpture’s true title is “Liberty Enlightening the World.
Bartholdi’s mother, Charlotte, who is rumored to be the model for Liberty’s massive copper visage. (Bartholdi’s wife posed for the arms and torso.)

The island where she stands was called Bedloe’s Island (after an early Dutch settler) until 1956, when it was renamed Liberty Island by an act of Congress. Liberty Island and Ellis Island are two separate islands in the New York Harbor.
Ellis Island became known as the gateway to New York for millions of immigrants, who passed through the inspection station on the island between 1892 and 1954. Ellis Island is now home to the Ellis Island Immigration Museum, which also includes the American Family Immigration History Center, also Oyster beds, a smallpox quarantine station, a Scottish Earl’s summer estate, a recruitment center, and now a National Park and museum. 
The Lady stands on a pedestal, and the pedestal stands on a disused granite fort in the shape of an 11-pointed star. Fort Wood, completed in 1811, once held 77 mounted guns and a garrison of 350 U.S. Army troops to protect New York harbor. Today it holds a museum.