William McKinley Monument photograph

This image of the William McKinley Monument, located in Canton, Ohio, shows the monument’s front exterior. A man and a woman are descending the steps (108) that lead to the memorial building. The monument’s dome and the statue dominate the view. William McKinley, Jr. (1843-1901), was president of the United States from March 1897 to September 1901. He was born in Niles, Ohio, but spent much of his life in Canton, Ohio. Early in his second term, in summer 1901, McKinley embarked on a cross-country tour during which he stopped in Buffalo, New York, to give a speech at the Pan American Exposition. Leon Czolgosz shot and fatally wounded the president during his visit to the exposition. McKinley died eight days later, on September 14, 1901. Formed after the president’s death, the McKinley Memorial Association helped raise the funds to build this memorial. The remains of McKinley, his wife, Ida Saxton McKinley, and two of their children are interred inside the memorial. Construction began on the memorial in 1905. Designed by Harold Van Buren Magonigle, the monument has two domes. One dome, which is fifty feet in diameter and seventy-five feet high, is known as the interior dome. The exterior dome is seventy-five feet in diameter and ninety-five feet high. President Theodore Roosevelt, who became president upon McKinley's death, dedicated the memorial on September 30, 1907. Located next to the McKinley National Memorial is the William McKinley Presidential Library & Museum, which contains one of the largest collections of McKinley artifacts. The image was among the photographs produced by the Federal Works Progress Administration (WPA) between 1935 and 1943