Mount Rushmore National Memorial

Tel: (605) 574-2523

Supporters of Rudy Giuilani, Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama can all agree on one – these are four great presidents carved in stone at Mt. Rushmore, where George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosvelt are depicted grouped together in a bipartisan collection of 60 foot sculptures, carved out of Black Hills granite.

The project began in 1923 as an attempt to bring tourists to the Black Hills of South Dakota, and it seems to have accomplished that goal – Mt. Rushmore is the number one tourist destination in South Dakota. Working with dynamite, drills, hammers and wedges and supervised by the sculptor Gutzon Borglum work was completed in 1941. Miraculously, no one was killed.

The monument has been a source of controversy with the Lakota Indians, whose ownership of the Black Hills was guaranteed by an 1868 treaty, and by the inclusion of Teddy Roosevelt, not known for his good treatment of Native Americans. The Crazy Horse Memorial, now under construction nearby, represents the Lakota Indian culture.

The site, 25 miles from Rapid City, is best visited in two shifts. Start off in the evening, around 9 pm (though this may vary by season) with the nightly lighting ceremony, after which Mt. Rushmore remains lit for a few hours. Then go spend the night in one of the many motels and inns in Keystone, South Dakota, two miles from Mt. Rushmore. Wake up early the next morning to go catch the early morning light on the presidential faces. There are several short trails offering views of the carvings, as well as a short nature trail. The visitors' center and museum, and the Sculptor's Studio are open till 10pm in the summer and 5pm in the winter.

And for some interesting facts about the site (feel free to use them to impress your friends) – Jefferson was originally to the left of the quartet. But there was not enough room to complete the project so his head was moved to the right. Rushmore was named after the New York lawyer Charles Rushmore who owned the land on which the sculpture was created. The original idea was to have full length sculptures that would have been almost 500 feet tall. Susan B. Anthony was proposed by Congress as a fifth face. The famous chase scene, with Cary Grant, across the faces on Mt. Rushmore in Alfred Hitchcock's film "North by Northwest" was not filmed here. And the replacement of the sculptures in Superman II, Mars Attacks and other movies and photos never really took place.