The Love New York Guide № 003: The Statue of Liberty

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The torch you see today is not the one Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi designed. The original 1886 flame was solid copper, later cut with portholes to glow from within — a modification that leaked and corroded so badly that in 1986 it was replaced entirely with a new torch covered in 24-karat gold leaf, lit by reflected sunlight during the day and floodlights at night. The old flame now stands in the monument’s lobby museum. This is Guide № 003 in The Love New York Guide series.

A Gift With a Long Backstory

The full name of the statue is “Liberty Enlightening the World”, and it was conceived by French law professor Édouard de Laboulaye as a gesture of friendship between France and the United States, tied to ideals of liberty and the end of slavery. France funded the statue itself; the United States was responsible for the pedestal. Bartholdi designed the figure, and the internal iron framework that holds her up was engineered by Gustave Eiffel — the same engineer who would later build the Eiffel Tower.

The statue was shipped from France in 350 pieces packed into 214 crates, reassembled on what was then called Bedloe’s Island, and dedicated on October 28, 1886. Fundraising for the pedestal had stalled until publisher Joseph Pulitzer ran a campaign in his newspaper, printing the name of every donor no matter how small the gift — an effort that drew in more than 120,000 contributors.

How She Is Actually Built

The statue’s skin is made of copper sheets only about 2.4 millimeters thick — roughly the thickness of two stacked pennies — hammered into shape and hung on Eiffel’s internal framework. That copper is why she is green. When new, the statue was the brown color of a fresh penny; over roughly two decades, exposure to air and sea spray formed a patina of copper carbonate and sulfate that turned her the pale green she is today. The patina is not damage — it actually protects the copper beneath from further corrosion.

From the ground to the tip of the torch, the statue stands about 305 feet including the pedestal and foundation, and the figure alone measures roughly 151 feet. Her face is said to be a little over 8 feet tall, and her sandal would be around a men’s size 879 if such a shoe existed. The seven rays on her crown are commonly described as representing the seven continents and seven seas.

The Details Most People Miss

Look at her feet and you will find a broken chain and shackle, largely hidden by her robes and nearly impossible to see from the ground or from a boat. These represent liberty breaking free from oppression and tyranny, and they connect directly to Laboulaye’s abolitionist convictions. In her left arm she holds a tablet inscribed in Roman numerals with JULY IV MDCCLXXVI — July 4, 1776, the date of the Declaration of Independence.

Access to the statue is tiered, and the differences matter if you are planning a visit. General ferry tickets get you onto Liberty Island to walk the grounds. Pedestal access requires a separate reservation, and reaching the crown — a climb of 162 narrow, spiral steps above the pedestal — sells out weeks or months ahead and is limited to a small number of visitors per day.

Getting There the Right Way

The only authorized way to land on Liberty Island is on the official ferry, which departs from Battery Park in Lower Manhattan and from Liberty State Park in Jersey City. The same ticket includes a stop at Ellis Island, home to the immigration station through which an estimated 12 million people passed between 1892 and 1954. Boats that circle the harbor without docking are a different product — you will see the statue, but you will not set foot on the island.

Every ferry passenger goes through airport-style security screening before boarding, so we tell visitors to arrive early and travel light. The statue and Ellis Island are administered by the National Park Service, and there is no admission fee for the islands themselves — the cost is the ferry ticket, with crown and pedestal access added on top when reserved in advance.

Myths Worth Retiring

Myth: The Statue of Liberty stands on Ellis Island. It does not. The statue sits on Liberty Island; Ellis Island is a separate island nearby, and the two are linked by the same ferry route but are distinct places with different histories.

Myth: She was always green. The statue arrived a shiny reddish-brown copper color and gradually weathered to green over about 20 to 30 years. There was even public debate in the early 1900s about whether to paint her to stop the color change; the decision was to leave the protective patina alone.

Myth: The famous “Give me your tired, your poor” lines were part of the original design. Emma Lazarus wrote the sonnet “The New Colossus” in 1883 to help raise money for the pedestal, and it was not mounted on the statue until 1903, well after the dedication. The association of the statue with immigration grew largely from that poem.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can you still go up to the crown?

Yes, but you must book a crown ticket well in advance, as daily numbers are strictly limited. The climb is 162 steps up a tight spiral staircase above the pedestal, there is no elevator for that final stretch, and it is not suited to anyone with mobility, heart, or claustrophobia concerns.

How long should a visit take?

We suggest planning for at least half a day. Between the ferry ride, security screening, time on Liberty Island, and a stop at Ellis Island’s immigration museum, most visitors find the round trip comfortably fills four to five hours or more.

Is there a fee to enter the statue grounds?

There is no admission charge for Liberty Island or Ellis Island themselves. You pay for the round-trip ferry, and reserved pedestal or crown access is included in specific ticket tiers booked ahead of time.

More The Love New York Guides

The Love New York Guide is a numbered series — one tightly focused subject at a time, each with its own downloadable collectible edition. Guide № 001 is The New York Bagel, Guide № 002 is The Fourth of July in New York, This is Guide № 003. More editions are on the way.