The construction of this memorial tower went through a tortuous process. It was the Congress during the American Revolutionary War in 1783 that initially initiated the construction of a monument to honor Washington, but it was not implemented at that time. It was not until five years after Washington's death that some influential people in the U.S. capital formed a preparatory committee for the construction of the Washington National Monument and proposed "building a magnificent national monument to commemorate Washington at the seat of the federal government." The original plan envisaged that this monumental building would be built into the Great Temple of the United States, and it would also be an exhibition hall of statues of past U.S. presidents and national heroes, including a giant statue of George Washington. Later, during construction, major changes were made to the original design plan. When completed, it was a hollow tower without decoration. The tower above the ground floor is 555.5 feet (169.3 meters) tall. Its well-proportioned proportions and concise and lively approach reflect the style of classical architecture. Americans claim to be comparable to the pyramids of Egypt.
On July 4, 1848, a solemn groundbreaking ceremony was held. A tile knife used by George Washington when he laid the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol in 1793 was also used during the ceremony.
The memorial tower project went relatively smoothly in the first six years. However, due to the Civil War, the memorial tower, which had been built to a height of 150 feet (45.7 meters), was stopped. Until August 2, 1876, President Grant approved a decree instructing the federal government to continue completing the monument project. When construction continued, although the outer walls of the tower were still clad with off-white marble from Maryland, and the texture of the marble was the same as the stone used in the completed part in the past, the latter batch was quarried from another stone layer. , after the completion of the project, the upper and lower sections of the tower's appearance had obvious differences in color, which are still clearly visible to this day. On August 9, 1884, the tower was built to a height of 500 feet (152 meters), and it was topped out on December 6 of the same year. At this point, the project is complete.
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