The Rush to Rushmore

When we finally got onto 44 the ride to Rushmore was pretty smooth. It is rather direct and even I was able to make my way there with limited assistance from the Garmin, who may or may not have turned heal on us.

The good part about our next camp ground, was that it was ideal for the traveling we were doing today. The camp ground is about 5 miles from Crazy Horse, which is about 8 miles from Mt. Rushmore. We didn't quite realize this at the time of booking, but it really worked out for the best.

Getting up to Rushmore involves many windy hills and mountains, and around every turn you hope that around the corner you are going to see the mountain face. When you finally see the face (or I guess in this case faces) it really is an awesome spectacle. Here are some more cell phone pictures to prove it.

On the way to Rushmore I am not going to lie, I was expecting a bit of a let down. I mean how exciting can some heads on a mountain be, that I have already seen hundreds of thousands of times on TV or in books and magazines?

Well, it wasn't a let down. Mount Rushmore is amazing. As you make that final winding, turn and see the faces on the mountain, the initial feeling is a bit overwhelming. A sense of awe and amazement set it, that mere pictures cannot capture or give proper justice to. The faces look so alien on the rock framing, and that adds to the charm and grace of the monument. The sheer size of the faces embedded into the mountain make it a scene unto its own.

Much of the self guided tour of Rushmore is focused on the builder/ lead designer of Rushmore, Gutzon Borglum, and of course those president guys who actually make up the thing. The other part that is cool is being able to see the individual faces from many different angles and really being able to appreciate the work that went into it.

A few interesting fact about Rushmore:

1) Not one person died while making it.

2) Much of the blasting that needed to be done got workers to with in 6 inches of where they had to be carving.

3) Funding to Rushmore was cut with the onset of WWII. Gutzon Borgum died on his way to congress to appeal to them for more money.

4) Borgum's son, Lincoln Borgum was the one who actually "finished" the monument.

5) One of Borgum's assistance, Korczak Ziolkowski, went on to become the designer and builder of the Crazy Horse memorial about 8 miles from Rushmore.

Crazy Horse, was a famous Indian, yet at the memorial they only really focus on his quote of "My land is where my dead lie buried." Upon arrival, it doesn't look like anything more than half of a big head on a mountain. But there are many things about Crazy Horse that make it extremely interesting.

The first thing is that upon completion, you will be able to fit all of Mount Rushmore on Crazy Horse's head alone. The does not even include the size of Crazy Horse's outstretched, pointing arm, or his horse. The arm points out over land, that symbolized Crazy Horse's famous quote that is plastered around the Crazy Horse museum and monument ground.

Another interesting fact is that the builders of Crazy Horse do not accept one dollar of federal funding. All money that is used to build Crazy Horse comes from donations and money that is collected by people who visit Crazy Horse and pay the 10$ per person entrance fee. Apparently they find charging people 10$ a head a better way to raise money than say, oh I don't know, opening a casino, or pillaging cars in the Badlands.

They do no accept money from the federal government because Ziolkowski believed that if he began accepting federal funding from the government that the funding would be cut before completion of the project (See Mount Rushmore), leaving his vision incomplete. While Ziolkowski passed away before completion, his family still carries on the majority of building responsibilities and engineering. I should also note that for the first 5 years of the construction of Crazy Horse, Ziolkowski literally worked on making Crazy Horse by himself. Traveling all the way up the mountain by himself, and blasting, drilling, and carving all by himself.

Interesting stuff, horse riding comes next. We are in Boise now taking a 2 day sabbatical. More to come.