[3] The monument's lighthouse-style features projecting beams of light, forming a cross shape, which are so powerful that they can be seen from neighboring Puerto Rico.

The concept was accepted during the 1923 Fifth International Conference in Chile, when it was decreed that this monument should be built in cooperation by all governments and peoples of the Americas.

The event was held in Brazil in 1931, with judges including architects Horacio Acosta y Lara (Uruguay), Eliel Saarinen (Finland), and Frank Lloyd Wright (USA).

During the government of Joaquín Balaguer, construction resumed under the supervision of the Dominican architect Teófilo Carbonell, and culminated with its completion in 1992, in time for the celebration of the quincentennial discovery of the Americas.

The exhibitions house items of cultural heritage from each country; Tony Horwitz wrote in 2008 that the United States's exhibition included a handful of small photographs of Independence Day celebrations, as well as many poster-sized reproductions of newspaper front pages reporting on the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.