The Declaration of Independence was read, every miner’s head nodding at the fistful of fighting words aimed at England. A still moment followed. On command, solemn-faced men removed the large American flag that had been wrapped around an imposing object. The crowd gasped: there stood a bronze equestrian statue mounted on a massive block of granite. It was Thomas Francis Meagher, forever young, forever defiant, facing the distant Big Belt Mountains and the waters of the Missouri. Chiseled on the side were excerpts from the 1846 speech he gave in Dublin at the age of twenty-two—his attempt to
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