Cockerel Weathervane

date: 2026-06-01

A cockerel weathervane from a New England church, photographed by the Detroit Publishing Company c. 1900. The weathervane cock — the gallus campanarius of medieval ecclesiology — is one of the most widely disseminated of all Christian symbols, recalling Peter’s denial and the resurrection morning.

The image is part of the Library of Congress’s Detroit Publishing Company Collection, a remarkable archive of late-nineteenth and early-twentieth-century American photography now in the public domain.