7/10: Pursuing Dreams: Mount Rushmore & Crazy Horse!

Steven and I had come back to South Dakota's Black Hills primarily to visit Mount Rushmore National Memorial, a place we hadn't seen for probably twenty years. The colossal sculpted heads of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln was one of the largest and grandest pieces of sculpture ever created.

Being in the throes of Covid-19 when we were visiting Mount Rushmore, I remember being more than a tad apprehensive with the number of people on the appropriately named Grand View Terrace.

As you may recall from the summer news, the Mississippi legislators were then in the middle of redesigning their state flag to eliminate references to the Confederacy. As a result, the prior state flag was the only one missing in the parade of state flags.

The bust of Gutzon Borglum on the terrace honored the Mount Rushmore sculptor who declared "A monument's dimensions should be determined by the importance to civilization of the events commemorated." When Borglum arrived in South Dakota's Black Hills to sculpt his most famous and largest work in 1925 at the age of 58, he had already been a successful sculptor and painter for decades. It was awe inspiring to read the list of the public monuments and memorials Borglum had created around the world. 

The four US presidents carved into the granite had been chosen by Borglum to commemorate the country's founding, growth, preservation, and development. They symbolized the principles of freedom and liberty upon which the nation was founded. Washington represented the struggle for independence and the birth of the Republic;  Jefferson the country's territorial expansion;  Lincoln, the States' permanent union; and Roosevelt, the rights of the common man and the conservation of the nation's natural resources.

President Trump had just been here at the amphitheater on the 4th of July to celebrate Independence Day with a huge fireworks display.

Another image of Borglum:

After the carving site for Rushmore had been selected, Borglum examined photos, portraits, and descriptions of the presidents before creating individual and groupings of model studies.

We had some excitement in the Visitors' Center when alarms went off and lights blazed forcing everyone to evacuate! After it turned out that a worker had gotten some dust in the smoke alarm, everyone was able to reenter.

Though Mount Rushmore was initially conceived by a local businessman to draw people to the Black Hills as a tourist attraction, Borglum envisioned a memorial "to the ideals of democracy." The original estimate was for the carving to be completed in five years at a cost of $500,000, but it ended up taking 14 years and double the original estimate. It's safe to say that the end result is far than a tourist attraction and is a national symbol.

Mostly local men - miners ranchers, and lumbermen - were tasked with carving Mount Rushmore over the course of 14 years it took to carve the memorial. Before almost 400 men and women could begin working each day, they had to climb a tortuous stairway of over 700 steps to reach the top of the mountain!

Right from the beginning, Rushmore was a tourist destination with over 130,000 people drawn to the remote area in 1933 during the middle of the Great Depression, even though travel had to have been so difficult on the unpaved, rural gravel roads. In the early years, visitors could scale the mountain and talk to the carvers or see Borglum in his studio working on the model!

Miniature plaster and lead crystal castings of the models were made by Borglum to help fundraise for the memorial's costs. What a terrific souvenir to have that would be! Though the cost of the memorial was intended to be paid for by private donations, the federal government in the end financed almost the entire project.

When Borglum died at the age of 74 in 1941 from surgery complications, responsibility for completing Mount Rushmore was immediately transferred to his son, Lincoln, who had been project manager since 1938. Fortunately, most of the work had been completed at the time of Borglum's death except for additional work Lincoln did on the figures' hair, collars, and lapels. With the approach of WW II, no more federal funding was available and all work on the memorial ceased on October 31, 1941.

A walk along the Presidential Trail took us very close to each of the president's images. The first was of Washington who was unanimously elected our first president and served from 1789-97. He was responsible for passing the nation's first tax laws and the Bill of Rights, the founding principles of the new union. As Washington's figure was the first started by Borglum and his face was in higher relief than the others, Washington's visage has remained the most prominent. 

A controlled burn that had taken place in May explained why so many of the tree trunks were black.

As we got so much closer, we could spot the air drill marks on the bottom of Lincoln's head. During his term from 1861-5, Lincoln devoted his presidency to ending the Civil War, restoring the Union, and issuing the Emancipation Proclamation, the first step toward ending slavery.  

During Jefferson's tenure as the third president from 1801-09, France sold the Louisiana Purchase to the US for $15 million, African slaves could no longer be imported to the US, and Lewis and Clark explored the Northwest. Jefferson was also the principal author of the Declaration of Independence. Borglum wrote a year before his death that he regretted only being able to make one portrait of Jefferson as he envisioned him as a torch bearer, builder, musician, and creator.

A view looking back to the flag-draped Grand Terrace and part of the amphitheater:

While we were gazing at the magnificent memorial, a man asked me in all seriousness whether he thought there was room for Trump atop the memorial. I don't think he cared for my irreverent response when I said, "God, I hope not!" As you may recall, this was shortly after Trump himself had also mentioned the same possibility. But it has long been established that no other figures can be added to Mount Rushmore.

We had a different angle from this vantage point of Roosevelt situated in the middle between Jefferson and Lincoln. When William McKinley was assassinated, as his vice-president Roosevelt became the youngest President at just 41. He was responsible for beginning construction of the Panama Canal, worked to bring big business under regulation, and was the first president to travel outside the US.

From the President's Trail we toured the Sculptors Studio where we attended a pretty fascinating talk about the intricate planning involved of the memorial's construction. The ranger told her audience that this was the ninth version of the scale model of Jefferson who was originally supposed to be on the other side of Washington.

However, when a huge crack was discovered down the middle, workers had to blast away all the work and start all over again. The ranger explained that Borglum had used a 1:12 ratio so that one inch was equal to one foot on the mountain and that a pointing system on the top of Lincoln's head was like a compass. 

It seemed absolutely remarkable that using dynamite allowed the crew to get within 3" when carving the presidents' faces! Thirty-five pound jackhammers were then used by miners in bosun chairs suspended over the mountain to remove the final layers of rock.

Ponderosa pines were named for their ponderous or heavy appearance in the Pacific Northwest where they grow to immense heights. The largest ones in the Black Hills grown to about 100 feet tall with their trunks almost three feet in diameter. If you wondered how the Black Hills came by their name, you can credit the Sioux Native Americans who thought that the distant hills covered by the deep green ponderosa trees looked black and therefore called them paha sapa or Black Hills. 

Though it was easy to believe that Borglum had to have planned this perfect spot for the idyllic view of our first president, George Washington, it was actually accidental. Borglum had planned to place Jefferson on Washington's right but the poor-quality rock here required him to change his design even though workers had already blocked out the rough features of Jefferson's face. 

After the workers blasted away and smoothed out the Jefferson carving, visitors had a fantastic, clear view of Washington's profile from this spot. His mouth has been measured at 18 feet wide and his schnozzle at two feet taller! If Borglum had used the same dimensions to carve the Founding Father's entire body, he would have been as tall as a 40-foot building!

Our biggest takeaway on leaving Mount Rushmore was how Borglum had made a lofty dream into a colossal reality, one that all Americans can take pride in.

As we drove next toward Crazy Horse Memorial, we stopped for a picnic lunch at Breezy Point Picnic Area and, just beyond it, a view of ...

Horsethief Lake. We read that the Civilian Conservation Corps had created the lake after building a dam on Pine Creek.

This was also a return trip for us to nearby Crazy Horse, the giant mountain sculpture begun at the request by Lakota chiefs of Korczak Ziolkowski to build a monument to represent all Native American tribes. Ziolkowski had been a self-taught but renowned sculptor who had come to the attention of Chief Standing Bear at the 1939 World's Fair.

There was a pretty steep admission fee to enter the memorial but the parking was free. I am sure it was intentional that that was the reverse of Mount Rushmore! It was hard to complain about paying anything at Crazy Horse because no federal or state funds were used for any of it.

We were both curious to see how much Crazy Horse had changed in the twenty or so years since we had last been here. We were both pretty disappointed  that it didn't look any different to our naked eye than it had twenty plus years earlier!

When it's completed, and the operative word here is indeed when, the figure of Crazy Horse atop his horse is supposed to be 563 feet high and 641 feet long, making it the largest statue in the world. I purposely wrote when in italics as nothing appeared to have changed on the memorial.

We did notice, though, that there was now a pretty fancy entrance monument and a first class visitors center that both seemed very new. 

Chief Henry Standing Bear was portrayed here next to Ziolkowski whom he had invited in 1939 to carve a monument because "My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, too." The Lakota leader, Crazy Horse, was chosen to be the subject of the memorial. He was to be carved more as a memorial to the spirit of Crazy Horse and to his people, not an exact likeness. 

If you click on the photo below to make it legible, you'll see the very gradual development of the memorial in the last almost seventy-five years. Ziolkowski and his wife had ten children who took part in the Dream of Crazy Horse as they were growing up. Fortunately, some of the Ziolkowski grandchildren are still involved in carrying on their grandparents' dream.

The Visitors' Center was about more than just Crazy Horse - it was also an appreciation of Native American arts and culture. The mission of the Crazy Horse Memorial Foundation had become "to protect and preserve the culture, tradition, and living heritage of al North American Indians."

We then listened to and watched an engaging presentation by a talented Native American family on the center's terrace. The woman, known by her English name of Whitney Rencountre, told the audience that when she performs, she often wears up to 60 pounds of jewelry, etc so that her dances are authentic. What a workout that must be!

As I recall their daughter was only five but was already showing great talent as a budding dancer.

At the end of the riveting performance, Whitney and her husband had everyone join in a socially distant circle which I remember feeling was quite powerful because of her way with words. It was no wonder we soon found out she was also a storyteller and had written a children's book. I was delighted to buy copies for both our six-week old granddaughter, Max, in San Francisco, and our then soon-to-be granddaughter, Clara, in Chicago.

A 1/34th size scale model of the completed Crazy Horse was on the terrace. 

Since we weren't able to get any closer to the memorial, it was neat they were giving away free samples of rock from the mountain!

Even though I doubt the memorial will ever be completed even within our children's lifetimes, we left remembering Ziolkowski's words he lived by: Never forget your dreams. That seemed also to be the same for Borglum's monumental Mount Rushmore!

Next post: The unforgettable Needles Highway, one of the most exciting roads in the world!

Posted on New Year's Day, 2021, from Tucson, Arizona. 2020 was such a horror show for untold millions of people, filled with unimaginable loss and distress. Steven and I count ourselves incredibly lucky to have escaped unscathed from the torment too many people have and are continuing to experience. Let us all hope and pray that the dawn of this new year will be a new beginning and one filled with hope and promise.