Statue of civil rights icon John Lewis installed in new Atlanta park

Mr Lewis was a towering figure of the fight for racial justice and died in 2020 at age of 80

U.S. Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) listens during a news conference September 25, 2017 on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC (Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Civil rights icon John Lewis will be immortalised with a statue at a new Atlanta park.

The statue of the late congressman was installed at the city’s Rodney Cook Park, which is being developed in the city.

Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms was on hand to see the seven-foot-tall monument arrive at the 16-acre park, located next to the Mercedes-Benz Stadium.

The statue will officially be unveiled later this year when the park opens.

Officials say that the statue of Mr Lewis will be joined by other monuments to other Georgia human rights figures such as Martin Luther King, Jr, and Jimmy Carter.

It will also feature a 10,000 volume library of the CT Vivian and Martin Luther King, Jr families, and a peace column on top of which will sit Tomochichi, a Yamacraw chief who was a foundational figure in Georgia.

Mr Lewis represented Georgia’s 5th Congressional District from 1987 to 2020, when he died at the age of 80.

Images of his brutal beating at Selma, Alabama, shocked the nation and led to the passing of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Along with Martin Luther King Jr, he was also an organizer of the March on Washington in 1963.