Mount Rushmore

We spent the last morning of our tour visiting two man-made features: Crazy Horse Memorial and Mount Rushmore. Crazy Horse was an important Oglala Dakota warrior who fought against encroachment by white settlers on the Dakota territories and way of life in the 19th century. In 1947 Henry Standing Bear, a Lakota Chief and elder statesman invited Korczak Ziokawski (who had worked on Mount Rushmore) to carve a mountain memorial to Crazy Horse and all Native Americans. Only the head is completed thus far. The entire sculpture is intended to be 641 feet long and 563 feet high! The finished project will be amazing to see one day. Apparently Crazy Horse was a modest, unassuming man. One wonders what he would have thought of this huge memorial.
I found Mount Rushmore National Memorial more impressive by daylight. Gutzon Borglum created the design and oversaw the carving from 1927-1941 with the help of his son, Lincoln. The sculptures of the heads of Washington, Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt and Lincoln are 60 feet high. We enjoyed lunch on a terrace with the memorial in the background and had time to explore and view the faces from several angles. We were glad to be some of the two million annual visitors.Read more