Following the completion of the similarly commemorative Hermannsdenkmal statue in Detmold, Germany, in 1875, the Germanic-American fraternal order of the Sons of Hermann, under the leadership of Julius Berndt, who headed the New Ulm chapter and was then national secretary of the order, paid for the erection of the American monument. The statue was created by Alfonz Pelzer of the W. H. Mullins Manufacturing Company in Salem, Ohio and shipped to New Ulm. It arrived in 1890 and was dedicated in 1897. Structural and cosmetic restoration projects were carried out in 1998 and again in 2004.