As a kid growing up in Minneapolis, I spent a fair amount of time down and around Lake Harriet. There’s a rose garden there (not far from where my beer can collecting habits began, on the north side of the lake), where I can’t say that I spent much time as a kid, but the elaborate fountain there (pictured above) always stuck in my memory as being something that felt like Old World Europe.
This past summer, I visited Minneapolis again, and took my girlfriend to see the Rose Garden, as she is an avid gardener. I wandered over to the fountain, and once again took full appreciation of its intricate beauty and old world charms, as you can see below. But this time, upon my return home, I did a little research and learned some fascinating things about this fountain.
My first thought at seeing something like this is that it might be something from 19th Century Paris, so I was a bit surprised to learn that it’s actually from the Italian Renaissance! The fountain was built in the late 1500s for Pope Sixtus V, who is notable for having the idea of converting the Roman Colosseum into a wool factory in an attempt to revitalize the area through industry, a plan which was thankfully never seen to completion. The fountain was originally located at Villa Montalto in Fiesole, Italy, which – from what I can gather – was originally an “oratory” (or chapel). So how does a Italian Renaissance fountain end up in Minnepolis? Enter Frank Totten Heffelfinger (born in Minneapolis in 1869), who was visiting the Villa Montalto in the 1920s and loved the fountain so much that he managed to negotiate to purchase it, presumably to have installed at his home in Minnesota. I’m not finding any documentation as to how an American could buy a fountain from a villa in Italy – or why it would even be for sale – but what does seem to be on record is that it was in the early 1920s that Frank Totten Heffelfinger bought the fountain from Villa Montalto, kept it in his own possession for nearly 20 years, and then in 1944 he decided to donate it to the Minneapolis Board of Park Commissioners. However, they chose to keep it in storage throughout World War II, and finally dedicated it to its current location near Lake Harriet in 1947.
(** Note added later: it seems that in the 19th century, the Villa Montalto was partially demolished and replaced by a railway station … perhaps the remaining aspects of the villa were considered dispensable by the 1920s when Heffelfinger came around?)
It’s not clear to me from any research as to whether Heffelfinger was just in Italy in the 1920s on vacation? Might have he served in World War I and came back to visit after the war? I’m not having any luck finding out more specific details about his life, whether he served in the military, or even what his occupation might have been that afforded him European trips and buying (and the cost of transporting) such a large fountain from Italy back to Minnesota … there’s a lot of gaps in the story.
It’s interesting to note that while the fountain is in Minneapolis, for some reason the Smithsonian American Art Museum (from Washington D.C.) has an entry on the fountain, stating that “… several putti (a figure in a work of art depicted as a chubby male child usually with wings) sit along the edges of a round basin, and a central figure rides a dolphin-like creature in the middle.” However, are these actually “putti” since they don’t have wings? And – if you look closely – they have furry legs with hooves. Perhaps they are “fauns,” which are mythological creatures that are half human and half goat or ram. The Smithsonian entry continues with “… below the basin on the pedestal are winged satyrs or gargoyles … water spouts out of their mouths into individual smaller basins … they represent the three ages of man.” You can see these guys in the image below (by the way – all of the photographs in this blog post are taken by me, Manzo Dakota).
So what are the “three ages of man” …? I see there’s a painting by Titian titled “The Three Ages of Man,” which depicts childhood, manhood, and the approaching of old age. In Titian’s painting, there are cherubic babies, a man interacting with a woman, and an old man in the background holding two human skulls. Had I known the three satyrs representated the three ages of man, I would have looked closer at them, but you can see what you can see here in my picture above.
Finally, as the Smithsonian also notes, the base has “… three fantasy reptilian creatures whose mouths spout water into the pool,” as you can see in the detail below.
It’s definitely a treasure for the city of Minneapolis to have this historic fountain for the public to enjoy. If you know any more about the history of the fountain, or details about the life of Frank Totten Heffelfinger and how he managed to buy this fountain, please share in the comments section below – I’d love to learn more, if possible.