Here are some facts about Mount Rushmore.
- Mount Rushmore is located in the Black Hills of South Dakota near to a town called Keystone.
- The Mount Rushmore National Memorial is a massive granite sculpture carved into the face of Mount Rushmore, depicting the faces of four Presidents of the United States: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln.
- The sculpture was created by Gutzon Borglum and his son, Lincoln, and it was the idea of Doane Robinson, an historian, who wanted to attract tourists to South Dakota.
- Gutzon Borglum was one of Auguste Rodin’s students.
- The carving of Mount Rushmore took place between 1927 and 1941.
- 400 workers (mostly miners) assisted Borglum during the construction of the sculpture. Not a single worker died during the project.
- Apparently, the Mount Rushmore construction crew had their own baseball team and they used to play fixtures against other teams from the region.
- Thomas Jefferson’s face was originally going to be positioned to the right of Washington, but he was moved to Washington’s left when the first area of granite was found to be unstable.
- Both dynamite and rock hammers were used to remove the rock during the carving process.
- Gutzon Borglum died in March 1941, before the project was completed. His son, Lincoln, continued with the work.
- The project was abandoned, due to lack of funding, before it was completed. Borglum had originally planned to carve the Presidents from the waist up, and he wanted to add carvings to represent the Louisiana Purchase and the Declaration of Independence.
- About 3 million people visit Mount Rushmore every year.
- Mount Rushmore has appeared in many movies over the years, including: North by Northwest and National Treasure: Book of Secrets.
- A cave was created behind the carved faces. This was intended to be the Hall of Records, but it was never completed.
