The Seven Mustangs - Proctor's Last Great Herd

The Seven Mustangs - Proctor's Last Great Herd

Photo: Another Believer, CC BY-SA 4.0 (cropped)

A stop on UT Austin Campus Walk, a free self-guided tour.

Seven bronze mustangs gallop together in front of the Texas Memorial Museum, manes flying. This is the work of Alexander Phimister Proctor, one of the great American sculptors of animals and the West.

The sculpture was commissioned in 1937. Proctor modeled the horses from 1939 to 1941, they were cast in bronze in 1947, and the group was dedicated in May 1948. He was around eighty when he finished it, and it became one of his last major works. The wild mustang, descended from horses brought by Spanish explorers, was a fitting symbol for a state proud of its frontier past.

Walk all the way around. Each horse is different, and from the sides you can see how Proctor arranged them so the whole herd seems to move as one. Behind them, the museum itself is the university's natural history museum, worth a stop if it is open.

Getting here: From the LBJ Library, walk back west and north to Trinity Street near 24th Street. The Mustangs stand in front of the Texas Memorial Museum.

Did you know?: From commission to dedication, The Seven Mustangs took about eleven years to finish.

Photo op: Crouch low in front of the lead horse so the herd seems to charge straight toward your camera.

More on Wikipedia: The Seven Mustangs · Alexander Phimister Proctor · Texas Science and Natural History Museum

Stops on this tour

  1. Main Building and UT Tower - The Campus Landmark
  2. Battle Hall - The Building That Set the Style
  3. Texas Union - The Living Room of Campus
  4. Harry Ransom Center - Treasures in the Lobby
  5. Littlefield Fountain - The Gateway to the Tower
  6. Ellsworth Kelly's Austin - A Chapel of Light
  7. Blanton Museum of Art - Petals on the Plaza
  8. Darrell K Royal-Texas Memorial Stadium - A War Memorial That Roars
  9. LBJ Presidential Library - Travertine Monument
  10. The Seven Mustangs - Proctor's Last Great Herd
  11. Turtle Pond - The Shadiest Spot on Campus
  12. Tower Garden - A Place to Remember