Piece of missing sculpture resurfaces in antiques store 50 years later

A piece of a sculpture that went missing from the Los Angeles Public Library 50 years ago has resurfaced in an Arizona antiques shop.

Floyd Lillard, owner of the Miners and Merchants antiques store in Bisbee, said he obtained the sculpture portion about 10 years ago, and his quest to find its origins was put on hold for a time while he battled cancer.

"If I hadn't made it through, no one would have remembered," Lillard told KOLD-TV. "No one would have known."

Lillard said a recent hunt for clues on Google brought him an old photo from a California newspaper showing the Well of Scribes, a sculpture that disappeared in 1969 from the Central Branch of the Los Angeles Public Library.

"You could only see half of the well in the picture," Lillard said. "That's the half that I had."

Lillard's portion is one of three pieces that composed the entire sculpture. He said he has been in contact with the Los Angeles Public Library about bringing the sculpture home.

The final two pieces of the sculpture are still missing, but Lillard said he has hope they might still be found.