Despite popular belief, the sculpture hanging outside of the Pasquerilla Spiritual Center and on the opposite side of the street from the Library’s Curtain Road entrance is not a depiction of Slenderman.

The statue is actually a World War II memorial crafted by painter, sculptor, and author Frederick Franck. It’s titled Hiroshima: The Unkillable Human and it was given as a gift in 1991 by Helen Boyle, Mary Boyle, and Rustum and Della Roy.

The sculpture is just one in a line of many that Franck’s created to depict times of war. As a young boy, Franck grew up in the Netherlands watching the horrors of the First World War unfold. The mangled bodies of the refugees he saw right outside his window inspired within him a life-long hatred for war.

The artwork he creates is meant to pay homage to those afflicted by the many cruelties of war. The sculpture outside of Pasquerilla depicts the figure of a human on a cement wall after the bombing of Hiroshima.

It’s not the only sculpture Franck has made depicting victims of Hiroshima. In fact, the city of Pittsburgh has a similar display that was gifted to the city to be placed along the Three Rivers Heritage Trail in 2003.

For Franck, Hiroshima: The Unkillable Human serves as a reminder of the cruelty of man and the need to ensure such horrors never occur again.