Following the death of Ellen in 1913 and her husband several years later, the association organized a committee to oversee the creation of these monuments, with architect Paul Philippe Cret developing a plan for three connected terraces with distinct themes represented by the sculptures present in them.

[1][note 1] Upon her death in 1913, she bequeathed much of her estate to the art association, specifying that the revenue raised from it be used to erect public sculptures that were "emblematic of the history of America—ranging in time from the earliest settlers of America to the present era".

[5] As a result, after her death, her widower J. Bunford Samuel commissioned Icelandic sculptor Einar Jónsson to create a sculpture of Thorfinn Karlsefni, an early European explorer of North America.

[11][4] Some in the local art community criticized Bunford for his selection of a non-American sculptor for the project, and according to Bendiner, there were efforts to prevent the statue from being erected in the park.

[14] This committee, consisting predominately of young men,[14] rejected Bunford's plans for a row of life-like statues and instead opted for more abstract sculptures that highlighted the "expression of the ideas, the motivations, the spiritual forces, and the yearnings that have created America".

[15] The committee hired Paul Philippe Cret,[16] a professor of architecture at the University of Pennsylvania, who created an overall design for the memorial, which would consist of three connected terraces along the Schuylkill River just south of the Girard Avenue Bridge that would house various sculptures.

[17] Seeking to honor her wishes, the committee sent requests to sculptors around the world to submit designs for the memorial and offered to pay for transporting select works.

[17] According to committee member Robert Sturgis Ingersoll, museum curator Henri Gabriel Marceau was the "sparkplug of the endeavor" who led the organizing efforts for this and all future Sculpture Internationals.

[19] The Public Ledger of Philadelphia held a reader straw poll, with voters selecting the works of Walker Hancock, Carl Milles, Harry Rosin, Alexander Stirling Calder, William Zorach, and Albert Laessle as the best.

[1] Other notable sculptors who participated in the 1933 Sculpture International include Alexander Archipenko, Jacques Lipchitz, Aristide Maillol, Henri Matisse, and Isamu Noguchi.

[21] The exhibition also featured a number of pieces of kinetic art, including two large mobiles by Calder and a rotating sculpture by Constantin Brâncuși displayed near the museum entrance.

[21] In the end, the committee selected Erwin Frey, Henry Kreis, Rosin, and Wheeler Williams to create works for the south terrace.

[62] In a 1976 publication, the art association stated that the memorial "[represents] a wide variety of artistic expression", with an overall style typical of that "used in Federal projects in the 1930s".

[64] In a 1976 book, Bendiner said Cret's overall design for the memorial was "mentally sound" and something that "could have been lovely", but called the overall choice of sculpture "a most irritating collection of uninteresting examples of the work of outstanding men and women, most of whom have done much better elsewhere".

[65] In a 1992 book, Bach stated that by the time the memorial was dedicated it was "as much a monument to the confusion about what constituted modern public art as a tribute to Mrs. Samuel's unprecedented generosity".

[4] Bach stated that the site's overall architectural design limited the sculptors' ability to create pieces for the memorial and called the overall choice of sculpture "unsettling".