The sculpture was donated to Congress by the New York financier Eugene Meyer Jr., as recorded on the marble pedestal also designed by Borglum on which the bust was installed in 1911.

For many decades it was displayed in United States Capitol rotunda, which still has a standing statue of Lincoln made by Vinnie Ream in 1871.

[1] Borglum had intended the marble bust to remain a unique work of art, but a mold was later made which was used to cast several copies in bronze.

Others are in the collections of the Chicago Historical Society, the College of the City of New York, the University of California, Berkeley, and the White House.

[2][3] The patina has been rubbed off the noses of the busts at the Lincoln Tomb and at Shepherd Hall, CUNY, where they are often touched for good luck.