Four months after taking office, President Washington directed his London agents, "to send me ... a terrestrial globe of the largest dimensions and of the most accurate and approved kind now in use." After the presidency, Washington placed it in his Study at Mount Vernon.

Considered to be the most accurate likeness of George Washington, the original terra-cotta bust was made by the French sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon at Mount Vernon in 1785 and can be seen today in the Museum.