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Reservation To Honor Matriarch With Statue

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By KAREN BRANCH-BRIOSO, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 27, 2007

TAMPA - Ruby Tiger Osceola moved off the Seminole Tribe's reservation in 2001, the year Hard Rock announced its partnership with the tribe to build a hotel and casino on the land at Interstate 4 and Orient Road.

She died the next year at 106. But Osceola - matriarch of the local Seminole clan - will return to the reservation next spring in the form of a life-size bronze statue.

"We just finished the molding," said Bradley Cooley, who sculpted the statue with his son, Bradley Cooley Jr., in their Lamont studio. "The casting is just starting on it."

The process of casting the statue in bronze will take about three months.

"Her daughters were here and critiqued it for us, it's been about a month ago," said Cooley, who added that the tribe commissioned the sculpture through its Department of Elder Affairs. "The Seminoles take real good care of their elders."

Come April, he said, the statue will be unveiled at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino on the land that was Osceola's home for two decades.

Cooley, 69, grew up on the Hillsborough River in Tampa, raising tropical fish. Then the self-taught artist moved to the Florida Panhandle to build a country home and his studio. He started out small, with bronze table-top sculptures of Native Americans.

Today, he is best known for his life-size and larger-than-life statues.

He and his son have sculpted several sculptures for the Seminole Tribe of Florida and other Native American tribes in the Southeast.

One of Osceola's many grandchildren, Danny Santiago of Brandon, looks forward to seeing his grandmother memorialized in bronze on the reservation where they lived.

"I can't wait to see it," Santiago said. "She was very traditional. We were all like her children to her. She was caring. She was strong on her feet for her age. She was the matriarch."

Reporter Karen Branch-Brioso can be reached at (813) 259-7815 or kbranch-brioso @tampatrib.com.

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