IMMACULATE REFURBISHING

Airport’s statues of Franco Harris and George Washington are getting an overhaul.

Call it the Immaculate Refurbishing.

The statues of Steelers great Franco Harris and American founding father George Washington have left their popular stations at Pittsburgh International Airport for an overhaul.

The two icons have greeted travelers near the escalators in the airport’s airside building for more than a decade. They have been among the most popular installations and the subject of innumerable selfies.

“Franco and George are going to get cleaned up, spit polished and shined, and come back to us,” said Christina Cassotis, CEO of the Allegheny County Airport Authority, which operates Pittsburgh International.

Both statues are expected to return this summer.

The rehab is being handled by the Sen. John Heinz History Center in the Strip District.

The work will reconstruct, clean and update the uniforms of both figures. The history center also is partnering with LifeFormations of Bowling Green, Ohio, to repaint facial features and to strengthen the figures’ hands and arms.

Both statues were removed Friday morning by history center curators and conservators.

The Franco Harris figure shows the football player making the Immaculate Reception in December 1972, one of the greatest plays in NFL history and one that helped launch the Steelers’ 1970s dynasty. The George Washington statue depicts him as a young British soldier while he was in Western Pennsylvania during the French and Indian War.