If controversies surround the Crazy Horse Memorial, which at least uses some of its revenue to put native youth through college, then Mount Rushmore, nine miles to the northeast, is one big controversy blasted into the face of a mountain. A monument hewn from sacred land, idolizing four abusers of this land’s original inhabitants. Washington, who ordered the eradication of Iroquois settlements across New York; Jefferson, chief engineer of the forced death marches euphemistically known as removal policies; Roosevelt, who championed an allotment system which amounted to nothing less than the legalized theft of native property; and Lincoln, who sentenced thirty-eight Dakota to death in what remains the largest mass execution in United States history. Not to denigrate or dismiss the other remarkable achievements of our country’s heroes, but the Black Hills seems a piss-poor place to give them a great big monument.
Though it was supposed to be even bigger. Originally, Gutzon Borglum intended to sculpt not just the faces but the upper bodies of the presidents on Mount Rushmore, and he planned to include Susan B. Anthony as well. But around the time funding for the sculpture ran out (when a big portion of the US Treasury was about to finance our involvement in World War II), the sculptor, conveniently, found instabilities in the granite which made further work indefensibly risky. So we’ve only got four faces on a mountain, and it’s still quite a sight to behold.
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This is the eighth post in a cross-country road trip series. To start from the beginning, click here!
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