Several artists submitted sketches, and Louis Rebisso was selected to design the statue, with a granite pedestal suggested by William Le Baron Jenney.

[1] The monument itself is an equestrian statue of Ulysses S. Grant, dressed in his American Civil War uniform and designed by Cincinnati sculptor Louis Rebisso.

[4] Noted skyscraper architect William Le Baron Jenney initially proposed that the bronze memorial statue should be fashioned atop an arched structure in the Romanesque style.

[5] Some criticism came from sculptor Lorado Taft, who in 1921 declared the monument to be "a nondescript pile of masonry", topped by a statue which matched its base in "a complete lack of artistic distinction".

[7] That same day, Illinois businessman Potter Palmer proposed to General Joseph Stockton, who had fought alongside Grant during the Vicksburg campaign, that there should be a statue to the recently deceased president in Chicago.

[12] In the mid-1990s, the Chicago Park District fully conserved the monument, a process which included cleaning and treating both the sculpture and pedestal, as well as installing new lighting.

John O. McGinnis, a professor at Northwestern University Pritzker School of Law, pushed back against the monument's potential removal, saying that "[n]o general was more responsible for the Union's victory in the Civil War than was Grant.

"[15] Kate Masur, another professor at Northwestern, argued against the "well intentioned, but ultimately disastrous" label, saying instead that Grant's personal policy towards American Indians was progressive for its time, and was hindered by other government officials.

[16] Tim Butler and Darin LaHood, members of the Illinois House of Representatives, both argued at once against the removal of statues dedicated to Grant or to Abraham Lincoln, as did the editorial board of the Chicago Tribune.