A year and eleven months after the Lorax Statue being stolen, the Lorax Statue has returned to the Preuss School UC San Diego in its original spot.

On December 2020, Preuss’s original Lorax Statue was sawed and stolen from the ankles up leaving only the feet and the pedestal. This affected the Preuss community greatly as the statue was a gift from the wife of Dr. Seuss, Audrey Geisel and because of how important it was to our school.

“When the Statue was stolen, it was a strange time as it had been stolen during our year online. So when Preuss students came back to campus the next year, they were confused as to what happened to the Lorax statue,” said Eric Romer, a former Preuss teacher and gardening club supervisor.

Even though things looked terrible, Preuss was able to eventually bring back the Lorax statue.

“Lucky Preuss had put ​insurance on the original Lorax statue when it first came. Because of this, we were able to make a full size copy of the Lorax statue and replace it with what had remained of the original Lorax statue,” Mr. Romer says.

With the Lorax statue back in our school, many were very glad that the Lorax Statue had returned as they could visit him once more.

Eliel Jimenez (‘26) says “I feel like with it back, it has spread some joy around the school with many other students not seeing it for a long time as they have been here longer and them just having a closer connection with the statue.”

Some students wonder what might happen to the new Lorax statue as some worry that the same thing will happen to the original statue, or worse.

“But with it back, I feel like it will be more protected and cared for so that nothing happens to it.,” Jimenez says.