The original plan for the statue of liberty came from Frederick August bartholdi’s idea of a statue/lighthouse symbolizing progress and carrying a torch at the entrance to the Suez Canal in port said, Egypt.
The project didn’t go through and was replaced with a cheaper and more sophisticated port said lighthouse, but Frederick’s idea eventually became the statue of liberty.
The fact that the statue was never built in the Suez Canal is probably a good thing, because although the statue of liberty eventually became a lighthouse, it never really functioned as one (despite attempts by the lighthouse commission to increase the brightness of the lights). Essentially, the statue of liberty was a lighthouse, though it never really worked.
