In the context of Statue of Kamehameha I (Kapaau, Hawaii), explain the Commission and delivery to Hawaiʻi of the Historical information.
The statue had its origins in 1878 when Walter M. Gibson, a member of the Hawaiian legislature at the time, decided to commission a sculpture to commemorate the 100 year arrival of Captain Cook to the Hawaiian Islands. The legislature appropriated $10,000 for the project and made Gibson chairman of the Commemorative Monument Committee formed to oversee the process. While the committee did include Native Hawaiians, it was strongly directed by Gibson and by King David Kalākaua.  After searching several prominent U.S. cities for an appropriate artist, Gibson contracted Thomas Ridgeway Gould, a Boston sculptor living abroad in Florence, Italy, to create the statue.By 1880, Gould finished the full-size plaster model for the work and sent it to the Barbedienne Foundry in Paris, France to be cast in brass. The finished brass sculpture was shipped from Bremen, Germany in August 1880 en route to Hawaiʻi, but after encountering a storm in the south Atlantic, a fire broke out on deck and the ship sank near the Falkland Islands. Its entire cargo, including the sculpture, was presumed lost. When news of the shipwreck reached Honolulu, officials decided to commission a second cast using the insurance funds collected after the loss of the original. Ironically, and unbeknownst to Honolulu officials, fishermen managed to recover the sunken statue, which was recognized and bought by a British ship captain who then sold it in 1882 to the Hawaiian government for $875. Now in possession of two identical statues, government officials decided to place the second cast, in considerably better condition than the original that had been damaged in the shipwreck, in the location originally intended to receive the statue, the Aliʻiōlani Hale government building in Honolulu. After some debate, the original was installed near Kamehameha I's birthplace in North Kohala. Due to the shipwreck, neither statue was on-hand in Hawaiʻi to fulfill Gibson's original plan of celebrating the 100th anniversary of Cook's arrival to the islands. However, Gibson was able to convince King Kalākaua to incorporate the unveiling of the Honolulu cast into his coronation ceremonies in February, 1883.
France Thomas Ridgeway Gould Captain Cook North Kohala Honolulu brass Germany Hawaiian Islands Florence Iron Italy Falkland Islands Kalākaua mana Paris Bremen Aliʻiōlani Hale Walter M. Gibson Hawaii Kamehameha I