Pan, the noisy, goat-footed god of the Greeks, returned to Chatham Manor in April 2013, whose riverfront he had graced since the 1920s–until vandals knocked him over in December 2002, shattering the stone statue.
The Rappahannock Valley Garden Club, the Rappahannock Fredericksburg Rotary Club, Friends of Chatham, and sculptors Scott McKee of Fredericksburg and James Robertson of Richmond restored the vandalized Colonial Revival sculpture at Chatham, the national historic landmark in Stafford County that serves as headquarters of Fredericksburg and Spotsylvania National Military Park in Stafford County, Virginia.
Pieces of Pan.
Pan ready to be pampered.
Putting Pan back together.
Sculpter Scott McKee puttting Pan back together again.
Pan being pampered.
Gazebo without Pan.
Patsy Thompson of the Rappahannock Valley Garden Club–one of three local groups that funded Pan’s restoration–holds a 2000 photo of Kathleen and Don Edwards used to check the statue’s position inside its Greek temple overlooking Fredericksburg, Va., across the Rappahannock River.
Scott McKee and his colleague, sculptor James Robinson, re-installed Pan to his rightful place in the gazebo.
Sculptor Scott McKee of Fredericksburg poses with Pan, the limestone statue he restored and reinstalled at Chatham Manor, and a photograph he used during the months-long restoration project.
Nancy Fahy (right) and Patsy Thompson photograph Pan’s installation, as Scott McKee and James Robertson apply lime mortar to join the 500-pound, 7-foot limestone statue to its base.
Pan dressed up for Virginia’s Historic Garden Week.
Restoring the Pan Cupola
In 2017, Friends of Chatham again partnered with the Rappahannock Valley Garden Club, the Rappahannock-Fredericksburg Rotary Club and the Duff McDuff Green, Jr. Fund of The Community Foundation to address some much-needed repairs to both the Pan Cupola and to Ceres, located at the entrance to the formal gardens. Scott McKee of Sculpture in Architecture again took on the challenge of cleaning and repairing much of the cupola structure. During that process, Mr. McKee found areas of the cupola roof and soffit that had suffered structure damage through the infiltration of water at various cracks and voids in the structure and the need to replace a section of the soffit that had been replaced years ago after being damaged by a tree limb.
The additional work involved a great deal of skill and the use of costly materials and equipment. Scott McKee and his colleague, David Via, began the second phase of restoring the Pan Cupola in the Spring of 2018 and this last phase was completed at the end of June 2018. Funding for this final phase was through the generous donations from the Rappahannock-Fredericksburg Rotary Club, dedicated donations from our members and funds from the General Preservation account of Friends of Chatham, which comes from membership fees in excess of the $25.00 base membership and non-dedicated donations. Thank you to all for your generosity!
The Pan Statue and Cupola Story is now complete …
Local Artists and Photographers
Honor Chatham’s “Pan”
“Approaching Pan” by Katherine McAskill
“Summer at Chatham” by Casey Alan Shaw
Photo courtesy of Penny A. Parrish
Chatham’s “Pan” Photo Courtesy of Thomas Sauerwein
Photo courtesy of Penny A. Parrish
