Our 3rd Monument Mount Rushmore

Mount Rushmore is in the Black Hills of South Dakota, where there is a national monument of four of our former Presidents carved. Two of which were our founding Fathers George Washington 1st President of the United States of America and Thomas Jefferson 3rd President of the United States of America. The other two are Abraham Lincoln the 16th President of the United States of America and Theodore Roosevelt the 26th President of the United States of America. 

Gutzon Borglum started carving them back in 1927 and had finished the Presidents face between 1934 and 1939. Gutzon was not able to finish the rest of the carvings due to his death in 1941, so Gutzon's son Lincoln Borglum finished the construction.

An interesting fact that I read was that the carvings were suppose to also include their waists. Due to the lack of funding they were not able to finish the rest of the carvings.

The United States National Park Service took control over the memorial back in 1933 and still run it today.

The entire monument covers 1,278.45 acres of land and is 5,725 feet above sea level. It attracts about 2 million people yearly from the United States and from other countries.

All the cultures that is the fabric of the country are represented by the memorial and surrounding Black Hills of South Dakota. The information that we want our visitors that visit Mount Rushmore National Memorial take away with them is the understanding and love that we have for our nation's history and cultures and the importance of caring for that legacy.

I will leave you a couple of quotes.

Quote 1: “Mount Rushmore is a memorial that symbolizes America, and Americans should never lose sight of their cultural beginnings.”

- Gerard Baker, Superintendent

Quote 2: “The purpose of the memorial is to communicate the founding, expansion, preservation, and unification of the United States with colossal statues of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt.”

- Gutzon Borglum

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Rushmore

http://mountrushmore.areaparks.com/parkinfo.html?pid=20892