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The Lambs Theatre Club, founded in 1874, was America’s first professional organization committed to the arts. Its structure is based upon its namesake formed in London five years before. The English club had been named after the playwright, Charles Lamb and his sister Mary. Both clubs enjoyed word play and called their president, the Shepherd, and their members, the Flock. This terminology took on an added poignancy during World War One, when tragically four American lambs were killed. As a fitting remembrance, the club commissioned Aitken, a lifelong member to design a memorial sculpture. The shepherd, the symbol of the club transcends and crosses time, an obvious symbol dating back to the Psalms and a fitting reminder of those lost, yet still cherished. On the shield, protecting the shepherd is the club motto, Florent Agni, meaning “Flourished Lambs.” Born in San Francisco, California, Robert Aitken first started painting as a pupil of Arthur Mathews and Douglas Tilden at the Mark Hopkins Institute. By the time he was eighteen, he had his own studio. In 1897, he studied briefly in Paris, where influences turned him to sculpture. He taught at the Hopkins Institute until 1904 and won some of the premier sculpture commissions including monuments to the Navy and to President McKinley in Golden Gate Park. In 1904, he returned to Paris for three more years and then settled in New York City where he was a long-time teacher at the National Academy of Design.

c. 1920 Bronze with brown patina and gilding