1. The model was at the Bronx Park Zoo. Sculptor Anna Vaughn Hyatt, an animalier, was commissioned to create the icon. She studied and made sketches of "Sultan," a black African lion housed at New York's Bronx Park Zoo, before creating a one-fourth-sized model.
2. It was made in Italy. The artist, who donated her skills to the school, traveled to Naples, Italy in 1907, to supervise the bronze casting of the lion at a local foundry.
3. It went from Steele High School to the Dayton Art Institute. The mascot kept watch over generations of Dayton students as they entered Steele High School at the corner of Main and Monument. In 1955, after the school had closed, Leo was moved to his current home perched outside the Dayton Art Institute overlooking the skyline.
Credit: Lynn Hulsey
Credit: Lynn Hulsey
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