The Encyclopedia Americana (1920)/Bitter, Karl Theodore Francis

BITTER, Karl Theodore Francis, Austro-American sculptor: b. Vienna, Austria, 6 Dec. 1867; d. 10 April 1915. He studied at the Vienna Academy with August Kuehne and Edmund Heller. He came to the United States in 1889 and soon acquired world-wide reputation. He won the competition for the Astor Memorial bronze doors in Trinity Church, New York. He executed the sculpture on the main buildings of the World's Columbian Exposition, and was appointed director of sculpture at the Pan-American Exposition at Buffalo, the Louisiana Purchase Exposition at Saint Louis and the Panama-Pacific International Exposition, San Francisco 1915. He executed much decorative sculpture for many buildings in New York and other cities, notably the Chamber of Commerce and the Metropolitan Museum, New York, and the Pennsylvania Railroad station, Philadelphia. He also executed a number of bronze and marble statues of a high order, including the Villard Memorial, New York, the Hubbard Memorial (‘Thanatos’), the equestrian statue of Gen. Franz Sigel, and the Carl Schurz Memorial, all in New York; the bust of Dr. Pepper in Philadelphia. He was awarded gold medals at Buffalo 1901, Philadelphia 1902, Saint Louis 1914. He was elected to the National Academy in 1902, and was also a member of the National Academy of Arts and Letters.