11 Solid Facts About Mount Rushmore

The project was approved in 1925 and construction took decades, but today, Mount Rushmore is an engineering marvel and an unlikely landmark. Millions of visitors come to gaze at the sculpted granite faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt every year. But it remains steeped in controversy. Here are 11 little-known facts about Mount Rushmore‘s creation and history.

1. Mount Rushmore was named after a lawyer visiting from New York.
2. Mount Rushmore’s head sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, previously worked on a huge Confederate monument.
3. The idea for Mount Rushmore began with South Dakota’s historian. 
4. Borglun liked Mount Rushmore because of its physical attributes.
5. Construction on Mount Rushmore began in 1927.
6. Eleanor Roosevelt wanted Susan B. Anthony on Mount Rushmore.
7. The construction crew used a technique called “honeycombing” to carve Mount Rushmore.
8. Mount Rushmore once had its own baseball team.
9. Mount Rushmore is two counties away from the U.S.’s geographic center.
10. The last surviving Mount Rushmore carver died in 2019.
11. Native American activists occupied Mount Rushmore in 1970.

Mount Rushmore was named after a lawyer visiting from New York.

When New York attorney Charles E. Rushmore, working on behalf of tin mining investors, first laid eyes on the the mountain in 1884, the sculpting effort was decades away. He asked his guides if the mountain had a name. They said no, and then added, “We will name it now, and name it Rushmore Peak.” Over time, it evolved into Mount Rushmore.

However, it did, and does, have a name that emerged long before the lawyer arrived in South Dakota. The Lakota people call the mountain Tȟuŋkášila Šákpe, or “Six Grandfathers,” the personification in stone of the creators in Lakota belief (North, South, East, West, Above, and Below).

Mount Rushmore’s head sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, previously worked on a huge Confederate monument.

Georgia’s Stone Mountain bears a 158-by-76-foot carving of Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and their horses. Borglum came up with the basic concept after the Daughters of the Confederacy asked him to sculpt Lee’s head into the rockface. On February 25, 1925, 10 years into the project, Borglum was fired after disputes with the organization and Stone Mountain was finished without his involvement. Vice President Spiro Agnew attended its dedication ceremony in 1970.

The idea for Mount Rushmore began with South Dakota’s historian. 

Intrigued by Stone Mountain, Jonah LeRoy “Doane” Robinson, South Dakota’s state historian, contacted Borglum in 1924. The Black Hills were already a tourist destination, but Robinson wanted an audacious new draw. Turning some local geologic features into a lineup of statues depicting western legends like Buffalo Bill Cody, Sacagawea, Red Cloud, Meriwether Lewis, and William Clark sounded like a good business move to Robinson. But Borglum had other ideas. In addition to changing the monument's proposed location—he opted for Mount Rushmore instead of the nearby granite spires Robinson had chosen—he also changed the people depicted. Feeling the place should be a “national monument commemorating America’s founders and builders,” the sculptor went with a presidential theme.

Borglun liked Mount Rushmore because of its physical attributes.

South Dakota is full of mountains, so why was the monument built on this one? First, Borglum realized it was sturdy enough to withstand the rigorous sculpting process. He also liked the fact that Mount Rushmore’s southeastern flank (where the faces now stand) gets good sun exposure. The mountain's fine-grained Harvey Peak granite also influenced Borglun's choice: Though the material was more difficult to carve, it would erode slower than the granite found on other nearby peaks.

Construction on Mount Rushmore began in 1927.

And it officially ended on October 31, 1941. Borglum unexpectedly died that March, leaving his son, Lincoln, to oversee the last few months of production.

Eleanor Roosevelt wanted Susan B. Anthony on Mount Rushmore.

Washington’s head was the first part of the monument to be dedicated, followed by Jefferson’s, Lincoln’s, and Roosevelt’s. Meanwhile, a different Roosevelt wanted Susan B. Anthony to join their ranks. First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt wrote to Borglum in 1936, asking him to include the prominent suffragist’s likeness. A bill reiterating this plea was introduced to Congress the following year, but it didn’t get far due to funding restrictions.

The construction crew used a technique called “honeycombing” to carve Mount Rushmore.

Dynamite cleared away 90 percent of the unwanted rock, but some tasks were ill-suited for explosives. Once they came within 3 to 6 inches of the desired depth, Borglum’s workers would drill shallow holes in tightly packed rows. Known as “honeycombing,” this trick allowed them to pull off chunks of granite with their bare hands.

Mount Rushmore once had its own baseball team.

While at Rushmore, Borglum and his son organized a baseball team made up entirely of their day-laborers. In 1939, the Rushmore Drillers had a great summer, qualifying for the semifinals in South Dakota’s Amateur Baseball Tournament.

Mount Rushmore is two counties away from the U.S.’s geographic center.

Alaska and Hawaii became states in 1959, shifting the geographic center of the U.S. from Smith County, Kansas, to Butte County, South Dakota. The exact spot is located on private land, but roughly 20 miles to the south, in the nearby city of Belle Fourche, South Dakota, there’s a compass-shaped monument honoring America’s midpoint. By car, the spot is only 79.4 miles from Mount Rushmore, the most iconic spot in Pennington County.

The last surviving Mount Rushmore carver died in 2019.

Donald “Nick” Clifford was a right-fielder on the Rushmore Drillers and the youngest carver to work on the monument. He was hired in 1938 at age 17. Clifford outlived all of his Mount Rushmore co-workers and died in 2019 at 98 years old.

Native American activists occupied Mount Rushmore in 1970.

The 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie set aside South Dakota’s Black Hills, Mount Rushmore included, for the exclusive use of Indigenous people. The United States then redrew the agreed-upon boundaries when General George A. Custer found gold in the region six years later.

On August 29, 1970, 23 Native activists climbed Mount Rushmore to demanding that the treaty be honored and land be restored to the Sioux. The group defied federal regulations, set up camp atop the mountain, and remained at the site until that November when bad weather finally drove them out. According to Lehman Brightman, one of the activists, it was “the first Sioux Indian uprising” since Custer’s lifetime.

In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled the U.S. government had acted illegally when it broke the treaty in the 1870s. As per the ruling, a compensation trust now worth over $1 billion was set aside for the Sioux. That money has never been collected.

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A version of this story was published in 2020; it has been updated for 2025.