The idea for building the statue of liberty began at a dinner party in Versailles, France, shortly after the American Civil War

The statement is correct. It all began in the year 1865 when a young french sculptor named Frédéric-Auguste Bartholdi went to a banquet near the city of Versailles and met a huge United States fan known as Edouard de Laboulaye. There they realized that in 1876 it would be the centenary of the american revolution and Edouard thought that it would be a great idea to gave the americans a present.

The present was going to be a gigantic statue that represents the freedom and the person who was gonna be in charge of such ambicious idea would be Frédéric. By the year 1871 he had almost the entire concept on his mind, the freedom would be represented by a lady and the name of the sculpture was Liberty Enlightening the World. The cost of the construction would be supported by the French State in wich concerns to the sculpture and the American State only had to build the base in which the statue should be placed.

On that very same year Bartholdi traveled to U. S. A. and choose the island of Bedloe (better known this days by the name of Island of Liberty) as the place where the statue should rest.

Unfortunately a series of delays in the construction made impossible to reach the deadline in the centenary of the nation on the year 1876. But finally on October 28th of the year 1886 the Statue of Liberty was inaugurated for the world by the president Glover Cleveland.