Sidney (Sid) Rackoff (1919-2014) created these sculptures in the 1990s. Representing hard physical labor, military service, and human suffering, they reflect the dedication and toil local men and women gave throughout history. Sid lived as a soldier, steel worker, small business owner, religious leader, and artist, and his art echoed those roles. The sculptures Coal Miner, Steel Worker, and Home from the War stand over nine feet tall, are constructed of scrap metal, and draw on Sidney Rackoff's life experiences. He created more than seventy statues in his lifetime. Rabbi Rackoff was also interested in the response his work provoked, whether admiration or repulsion. He enlisted in the Ohio 83rd Infantry Division, U.S. Army, during World War II and said, citing his war experiences, that the suffering of war had troubled him ever since 1945. He was not anti-war, but worked to show the suffering that war brings to people. In 1969, Sidney Rackoff graduated from Yeshiva University in New York, became a rabbi, and served Jewish communities in Ohio and Pennsylvania for more than thirty-five years. In the 1980s, Rabbi Rackoff attended art classes at Lorain County Community College and Cleveland State University, and he worked in several mediums, with metal sculpture being one of his artistic outlets.