A small crowd watches workers from Trisquare Fabrication LLC install a bronze sculpture of a bird with a hat in its beak atop a gantry crane beam at the former Sonntag building at 470 S. 900 East in Salt Lake City on Friday. The sculpture project took over a year to complete after Steve Price saved the gantry beam from being melted into rebar. The beam is over 100 years old and was used by Rio Grande and Union Pacific railroads to service trains in the yard. Price negotiated with several state agencies to save the gantry beam and turn it into an art piece for Salt Lake City. He teamed up with local artist Mike Wilson, who designed and created the raven that sits atop the beam before taking it to be bronzed at Adonis Bronze in Alpine. The raven holds a train conductor’s hat in its beak that is emblazoned with the Rio Grande logo and swings freely in the bird’s mouth.
