SOUTH DAKOTA
Immense landscape on our way to Custer, South Dakota from Wyoming, Highway 16
a full-sized oil rig
and a mini-sized oil rig
HERITAGE VILLAGE CAMPSITE
(Custer, South Dakota)
Just a five minute drive from downtown Custer and about fifteen from Mount Rushmore. The campground is 'unusually' quiet - pretty much the only people here (about six RV's) are seasonal workers - working at Mount Rushmore or the local Crazy Horse Memorial Park nearby.
DOWNTOWN CUSTER
Custer is the oldest town established by European American in the Black Hills. For thousands of years, the Black Hills had been part of the territory of varying indigenous tribes and a battle over the discovery of gold.
Furs, hides, tails, skulls, knives, bows & arrows.
PABST BLUE RIBBON BEER
The company has historically claimed that its flagship beer was named Pabst Blue Ribbon following a win as "America's Best" at the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893.
Not a beer connoisseur of beer products but just interesting as I remember ads for this beer 'many' years ago.
Pabst continued to produce this beer until the 1990's, when it was discontinued. The brand was revived in 2007 and is currently brewed under contract by the Miller Brewing Company in Milwaukee.
The BATTLE OF LITTLE BIGHORN
The Lakota and other Plains Indians call this battle, the Battle of the Greasy Grass.
June 25, 1876, near the Little Bighorn River in Montana Territory pitted federal troops led by Lieutenant Colonel George Armstrong Custer against a band of Lakota Sioux and Cheyenne warriors. When a number of tribes failed to move to reservations by the deadline, Custer and his 7th Cavalry were dispatched to confront them. Under command of Sitting Bull, Custer's forces were overwhelmed and lost the battle known as Custer's Last Stand or Battle of Little Bighorn.
Custer and some 200 men were attacked by as many as 3,000 Native American and within an hour, Custer and all of his soldiers were dead.
Within a five year period, the U.S. Government succeeded in subduing the tribes and forcing them to the confinement of reservations.
Colonel Custer is buried at West Point Cemetery, New York.
Lake Lakota (en route to Mount Rushmore), a small, quiet park with a few fisherman.
CUSTER STATE PARK
We drove the park loop which takes approximately two hours at a slow pace of about 25 miles/hour. All camping areas were booked so we just decided to check it out while here. A $20 fee is charged per vehicle (which is good for one day to one week). If you are not stopping or spending time in the park, we can drive through with no fees.
Custer State Park in its entirety is 71,000 acres of wildlife reserve in the Black Hills, named for Lt. Colonel George Armstrong Custer and just 15 miles from the city of Custer.
This Park is known for its free-ranging bison herd with some 1,500 animals (one of the largest herds in the world. The park is also home to elk. coyotes, mule deer, white tailed deer, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, otters, pronghorns and feral burros (known as the begging burrows as they approach vehicles, begging for food).
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Chamber of Commerce Statue |
The town of Custer
BIG ROCK PARK
Custer Skywalk to Big Rock Observation Point (just 2 blocks off the Main Street to the trail head) -approximately 205 steps and an elevation change of about 380 feet. Tazz wasn't keen on the steps - put the brakes on about halfway up.
MOUNT RUSHMORE
(October 4, 1927 - October 31, 1941)
Every year, up to three million visitors come to the entrance of Mount Rushmore National Memorial, in South Dakota, to the Avenue of Flags, to look up at the 60-foot busts of four presidents (George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt).
The photo above was take of Gutzon Borglum (on the left) observing two workers carving Jefferson's eye.
Mount Rushmore was a fourteen year project. A project of colossal ambition and achievement. It took nearly 400 men and women to complete. This was an undertaking inspired by a sculptor in 1914 - Gutzon Borglum. This was an immense undertaking and took dynamiting 450,000 tons of granite from the Black Hills.
Workers had to endure extreme weather conditions from blazing heat to extreme cold and wind. Each day they climbed 700 stairs to punch-in the time clock. 3/8" thick steel cables lowered them over the front of the 500 foot face of the mountain.
About 90% of the mountain was carved using dynamite. Workers in the winch house on top of the mountain would hand crank the winches to raise & lower the drillers. If they went too fast, the drillers in their 'bosun chairs' (the small buckets they were lifted in) would be dragged up on their faces. To keep this from happening, young men and boys were hired as call boys who sat at the edge of the mountain and shout messages back & forth to ensure safety.
Dynamite was used until only 3-6" of rock was left to remove to get the final carving surface. Then the drillers & assistant carvers would drill holes into the granite very close together - this was called 'honeycombing.' The closely drilled holes would weaken the granite and could be removed by hand.
$8.00 per day was the earnings for most workers.
Dynamite blasted away 450,000 tons of rock - a lot of that debris has been left in a heap at the base of the mountain.
Road to Mount Rushmore
Iron Mountain Road up to Mount Rushmore has three tunnels in which the tunnels are perfectly aligned in order for you to view the Monument through the tunnel.
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| 10' 9" wide by 11' 0" high |
17 miles of roadway with 314 curves, 14 switchbacks, 3 tunnels and 3 pigtails (turns which loop over their own road, allowing the road to climb rapidly).
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| Interpretive Centre, Gift shop and entrance to trails (photo courtesy of Reuter's - taken April 2020 during covid) |
Looking back at the Interpretive Centre and Amphitheatre
The "Father" of Mount Rushmore was Doane Robinson who was a South Dakota state historian from 1901-1926. He approached the Black and Yellow Trail Association and convinced them that the monument would be a special attraction to draw visitors and tourism to diversify the state economy. This began and process which ended in hiring Borglum and the sculpting began in 1927.
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| (Lt to rt) George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln |
The closest you get to the monument is more than 300 feet. People often complain about how disappointed they are in the size of the monument after seeing close-up photos. In real-life you are a distance away but you can still see the incredible detail and scope of this project. We found it amazing.
Former President Trump and First Lady Melania Trump arrive onstage during an Independence Day event July 3, 2020
The monument also sits on contested land. Before Trump's speech took place, a group of protesters largely comprised of Native Americans held a demonstration against Trump for using sacred land.
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| US National Park Service photo |
The face of Abraham Lincoln under construction in 1936 with Gutzon Borglum monitoring the work.
The 20-foot noses look giant next to a worker.
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| George Washington |
Since the sculptures are over 80 years old, they are constantly developing new cracks and in need of repair.
Water regularly seeps into the cracks of the mountain and freeze, which causes the granite to fracture. In 2008 alone, 144 cracks were reported along the monument. Repairs are done yearly.
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| George Washington & Thomas Jefferson |
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| Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln |
Sculptor, Gutzon Borglum had a grand vision that wasn't just the heads of four presidents. He wanted to build a room 80 feet tall x 100 feet long, behind Lincoln's head that would store some of America's most important documents such as the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
Borglum died mid-project and money ran out, the project was abandoned. In 1998, however, 16 porcelain panels explaining the history of the United States and of Mount Rushmore were placed inside the 70 foot hallway. Not open to public.
GEORGE S. MICKELSON TRAIL
George Mickelson was a Governor who spearheaded this project.
Completed in 1998 this trail system runs right past the Heritage Village Campgrounds. The trail is 109 miles long and contains more than 100 converted railroad bridges and 4 rock tunnels. The trail surface is primarily crushed limestone and the majority of the trail does not exceed 4% grade.
We cycled 11 miles each direction to Hill City:
BACK AT THE RANCH
The backside of the acreage at Heritage Village Campgrounds. This a seasonal, working horseback riding tour business.
This huge hall is still operational for some events but used to be a thriving live theatre hall with an amazing restaurant and entertainment.
These tiny buildings are still used during summer season for kid's activities during the horse riding camps. A small church, ice cream and hot dog stand, a jail house and kid's kitchen and doll house.
On our last evening, she came out of her cubby-hole (this, from about 60 feet away).
This is a view from the campground and where a lot of the people staying at the campground are working.
CRAZY HORSE MEMORIAL
Chief Standing Bear invited sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski to the Black Hills to carve Crazy Horse. The site is a memorial to preserve the culture, tradition and heritage of North American Indians. The entrance to the park allows the visitor to see the heritage museum and take a tour up to the carving.
When complete, the monument will depict Crazy Horse riding a horse, pointing to his tribal land. Began in 1948, the final dimensions will be 641 feet long and 563 feet high. The face was completed in 1998 and the head is 87 feet 6" high (the US Presidents of Mount Rushmore are 60 feet high).
Sadly, the sculptor Ziolkowski died in 1982. His family is overseeing the project and plans are still in process to complete the massive project.
We are now en route to CASPER, WYOMING
(we rerouted from our original plans to pass through the Grand Tetons as it was going to be snowing for several days).
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