The contentious statue on Wall Street known as “Fearless Girl” would never have existed at all if her creators had executed their original idea — a cowpat of a plan that was bound to sow its own controversy.

A life-size, bronze cow, of all things, was supposed to be the feminist symbolto grace the public plaza where the little girl now stands with her arms on her hips, facing Arturo Di Modica’s famous “Charging Bull.” As revealed in a set of emails obtained by the New York Post, the financial firm behind the stunt, State Street Global Advisors (SSGA), backtracked on the bronze bovine when it realized — just three months before it was set to be manufactured — that it might not be the smartest move to compare women to cows.

“The client realized, after we had gone down the road a bit, that a cow sculpture could be conceived as demeaning to women,” event consultant Stuart Weissman wrote to the director of the city’s Street Activity Permit Office, Dawn Tolson, in December. 

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