How does Statue of John Harvard elucidate its History?
On June 27, 1883,
at the Commencement Day dinner of Harvard alumni a letter was read[M]
from "a generous benefactor, General Samuel James Bridge, an adopted alumnus of the college":To the President and Fellows of Harvard College.Gentlemen, — I have the pleasure of offering you an ideal statue in bronze, representing your founder, the Rev. John Harvard, to be designed by Daniel C. French of Concord ... I am assured that the same can be in place by June 1, 1884.[M]Bridge specified an "ideal" statue because there was then (as now)
nothing to indicate what John Harvard had looked like;
thus when French began work in September he used Harvard student Sherman Hoar as inspiration for the figure's face.
"In looking about for a type of the early comers to our shores," he wrote, "I chose a lineal descendant of them for my model in the general structure of the face. He has more of what I want than anybody I know." 
(Through his father Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar‍—‌chairman[M] of Harvard's Board of Overseers‍—‌Sherman Hoar was descended from a brother of Harvard's fourth president Leonard Hoar,
as well as from Roger Sherman, a signer of the United States Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution.)
The commission weighed heavily on French even as the figure neared completion. "I am sometimes scared by the importance of this work. It is a subject that one might not have in a lifetime," wrote the sculptor‍—‌who thirty years later would create the statue of Abraham Lincoln for the Lincoln Memorial‍—‌"and a failure would be inexcusable. As a general thing, my model looks pretty well to me, but there are dark days."French's final model was ready the following May and realized in bronze by the Henry-Bonnard Bronze Company over the next several months.
The cost was reportedly more than $20,000 (equivalent to $700,000 in 2022).
The statue was installed‍—‌"looking wistfully into the western sky", said Harvard president
Charles W. Eliot[M]‍—‌at
the western end of Memorial Hall on the triangular city block then known as the Delta
(see Memorial Hall).
At its October 15, 1884 unveiling[M] Ellis gave
"a singularly felicitous address, telling the story of the life of John Harvard, who passes so mysteriously across the page of our early history." 
In 1920 French wrote
to Harvard president Abbott Lawrence Lowell desiring that the statue be relocated; in 1924
it was moved from Memorial Hall (then the college dining hall‍—‌a
Harvard Lampoon drawing showed John Harvard dismounting his plinth, chair in tow, and holding his nose because he "couldn't stand the smell of 'Mem' any longer")
to its current location on the west side of Harvard Yard's University Hall, facing Harvard Hall, Massachusetts Hall, and the Johnston Gate.
Later that year the Lampoon imagined the frustrations of the metallic, immobile John Harvard surrounded by Harvard under­graduates—Great men arise  /  Before my eyes  /  From yonder pile I foundedWhile I must sit    /  Quite out of it      /  My jealousy unbounded—though twelve years later David McCord portrayed the founder as satisfied in his stationarity:"Is that you, John Harvard?"  /    I said to his statue."Aye, that's me," said John,    /  "And after you're gone."A photograph of the statue appeared on the cover of the May 5, 1941 issue of Life magazine.Sometime in the 1990s tour guides began encouraging visitors to emulate a "student tradition"‍—‌nonexistent‍—‌of rubbing the toe of John Harvard's left shoe for luck, so that while the statue as a whole is darkly weathered the toe now "gleams almost throbbingly bright, as though from an excruciating inflammation of the bronze." 
It is, however, traditional for seniors, as they process to graduation exercises on Commencement Day (see History and traditions of Harvard commencements), to remove their caps as they pass.The statue is depicted on the United States Postal Service's 1986 John Harvard stamp (part of its Great Americans series).
John Harvard statue of Abraham Lincoln David McCord United States Declaration of Independence Johnston Gate Board of Overseers Harvard Hall Harvard Yard Commencement Day Charles W. Eliot Bronze United States Postal Service Henry-Bonnard Bronze Company University Hall Massachusetts Hall Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar Harvard College right plinth History and traditions of Harvard commencements Leonard Hoar rub Abbott Lawrence Lowell United States Constitution Memorial Hall Great Americans series President and Fellows of Harvard College Life the early comers to our shores left Samuel James Bridge Harvard Lampoon Sherman Hoar Lincoln Memorial Roger Sherman