Source: WTL photo© on site in Mexico City, 2008.
Image: Here you see, two glorietas up from Chapultepec Park on Paseo de la Reforma, the famous boulevard at the heart of Mexico City, the monument to independence. It is called El Ángel de la Independencia (The Angel of Independence), but more often it is called simply El Ángel. The column is properly called the Columna de la Independencia.
Comments: The monument was ordered begun by presidential dictator Porfirio Díaz in 1902, and it was dedicated in 1910 to celebrate the beginning of the Mexican war of independence in 1810. The column is 118 feet high, and the statue at the top, in the form of an angel, is an additional 22 feet high. The base holds a mausoleum for heroes of the independence war of 1810-1822; inside the column is a spiral staircase of 200 steps leading to the top. The architects and engineers were Mexicans, but all the sculptures were done by an Italian sculptor. In 1929 an eternal flame (Lámpara votiva) was added to honor the men and women who died heroically in the War of Independence. Some of those famous heroes are Ignacio Allende, Miguel Hidalgo, José María Morelos, Andrés Quintana Roo and his wife Leona Vicario, and Gen. Guadalupe Victoria, who was the first president of Mexico.
Close-up: For as much a close-up of the golden statue at the top of this monument as the professor-photographer could get with a simple digital camera, see: => Mexico City #16a.