The Mount Rushmore National
Memorial, located 25 miles south
west of Rapid City, South Dakota
in the Black Hills, was first
suggested by Jonah Robinson, a
member of the South Dakota State
Historical Society. The site for
the memorial, 6,000-foot high Mt.
Rushmore, was dedicated in 1925.
In 1927, a largely amateur work
force under the direction of
Gutzon Borglum, began to carve
this massive sculpture of the
heads of four United States
presidents, each 60 feet tall, into
the granite face of the mountain.
The presidents depicted are:
George Washington, representing
the founding of the nation;
Thomas Jefferson, representing
the nation's political philosophy;
Abraham Lincoln, representing
the preservation of the union; and
Theodore Roosevelt, representing
the conservation of the nation's
natural resources.
The huge memorial, completed in
1941, is seen by more than 2 mil-
lion visitors every year.
