LITTLE ROCK — The importance of bauxite miners in history has been recognized in a visual way.

On Sunday, the city of Bauxite gathered for the unveiling of a bronze statue, Unsung Heroes-Bauxite Miners, commissioned by the H. Tyndall Dickinson family.

The statue, sculpted by National Sculptors' Guild member Gary Alsum of Colorado, was unveiled by three former bauxite miners, Joe Doughty, Jack Bush and Cecil Rickard. The statue is displayed on the front lawn of the Bauxite Museum and curator Melba Shepard said the Dickinson family commissioned the statue as a way to give back to the community.

"The statue is dedicated to the city of Bauxite and Saline County in honor of bauxite miners and their families who made an impact on the mining industry in Arkansas and the world," Shepard said. "Their contribution to the aluminum industry during World War IIwas a major factor in the United States winning the war."

Dickinson is the president of McGeorge Contracting Co. in Sweet Home. Shepard said the company is a fourth-generation family business, where Dickinson began as a tractor cleaner. He declined to be interviewed.

Shepard said Alsum specializes in sculpting children.

"He is universally recognized and fondest ofcapturing children at play," Shepard said. "Most of his recent work has been commissioned, and he believes these to be some of his best pieces because they allow him to expand his creative ability and work with the ideas of others."

The life-size statue features a family of four, including a bauxite miner father.

"The family is seeing the father off to work ashe goes to the bauxite mines," Shepard said. "The father has on a hard hat and the mother is holding the daughter while the son is standing beside the father holding an airplane. The airplane represents the contributions bauxite made to the World War II efforts."

Shepard said World War I and World War II exerted a greater inf luence upon the course of development in the aluminum industry than any other industry.

"Bauxite was the only producer of pig aluminum on the North American continent, and it had to produce aluminum to meet war demands ofAmerica and its allies."

Shepard said the off-white, grayish, brown, yellow or reddish-brown rock is the principal commercial source of aluminum. It was discovered in Arkansas in the late 1800s. More than 5,000 tons of bauxite was produced in Arkansas in 1899, then more than 6 million tons were produced at its peak in 1943.

"Saline County's contribution to World War II efforts was enormous," Shepard said, adding that 305,000 planes were manufactured in the United States during the five and a half years of military preparation.

"This required over 3 billion pounds of aluminum, the majority of which was obtained form the mines of Bauxite."

Prior to the war the mines employed 450 employees; before the end of the war the mines had 7,000 employees.

Now t he popu lat ion of Bauxite is 434, according to figures obtained from the mayor's office. Former Bauxite resident Shorty Wilmoth recalled a time when Bauxite was a booming town full of miners and their families.

"Now, there is no commercial part to the town," Wilmoth said. "There is no stores, banks, nothing. Before, during the mining days, there were things like that here. For a long time the only thing that was here was the school and the museum; now things are starting to come back."

Wilmoth graduated from Bauxite High School, wherehe met wife. His father, grandfather and uncle all worked in the mines doing various jobs.

"My uncle was a mucker," Wilmoth said. "A mucker has the job of backing the muledrawn carriage into the mine and shoveling the ore into the wagon. They had a quota they had to reach every day, and they were paid by the wagon load.

"My grandfather was perfect for working in the mines because he was only 5 feet 2 inches tall," Wilmoth said. "He did everything in the mines."

Wilmoth and his family lived in a company house, which he said was eventually moved so miners could dig there.

"They mined where the ore was," Wilmoth said. "We wereliving in a company home at the time and had to move out so they could begin mining underneath our home."

Shepard said the statue is a great representation of family life in Bauxite.

"The mining industry has been good to Mr. Dickinson, and he wanted to give back to the miners and their families,"Shepard said. "And that's what this statue does."

The Bauxite Museum is at 6706 Benton Road. Its hours are 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Wednesdays and 1:30-4 p.m Sundays, or by appointment. Call (501) 557-9858 for more information.

- epannell@ arkansasonline.com

Tri-Lakes, Pages 59, 63 on 10/23/2008