There are a huge number of amazing statues in the world that you can admire for hours, and for which you can take a risky and long journey to unknown lands to see these colossal works of talented and skilled craftsmen of the past and present.

Mount Rushmore National Memorial is a monumental granite rock located in South Dakota, USA. The mountain is known for having giant sculptural portraits of four US presidents carved into its granite rock: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln. The height of each face is about 18 meters, and the width of the entire sculpture is 122 meters. Work on the creation of figures was carried out from 1927 to 1941. Sculptor Gatzon Borglum and his team of 400 assistants carved huge heads into the rock by blowing up the rocks with dynamite, and then carved the faces with a chisel and hammer to give them the necessary shape.

About 15 kilometers southwest of Mount Rushmore is the Crazy Horse Memorial. This is the world's largest memorial dedicated to the late Indian leader Crazy Horse and carved from a single rock. Construction on this gigantic statue began in 1948 by the Polish-born sculptor Korczak Ziłkowski. When the creator of the famous sculpture died in 1982, without having had time to bring his grandiose idea to its logical conclusion, his wife and children continued the work they had begun. If, however, someday the monument is completed, its width will be 195 meters and a height of 172 meters. To date, of the entire statue, there is only the face of a rider, completed in 1998.

America is home to another legendary granite carving - Stone Mountain, located in Georgia. This is a bas-relief sculpture of three Confederate leaders: President Jefferson Davis, General Robert Edward Lee, and Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson. The granite sculpture is 58 meters high and 93 meters wide.

Afghanistan used to be home to two huge Buddha statues at once in the Bamiyan Valley, less than 200 km northwest of Kabul. They were carved into the sand hills themselves about one and a half thousand years ago, 55 and 37 meters high, respectively. But both figures were savagely destroyed in 2001 by the Taliban, who believed that they were pagan idols and should be destroyed.

The Big Buddha statue at Leshan in Sichuan province, China, is the most striking asset of a Buddhist temple dating back to the first century. The seated Buddha is carved from a mountainside in the eighth century and is 71 meters high and 28 meters wide. His smallest toe is large enough even for one person, one can only imagine the gigantic size of this sculptural work.

The tallest sculpture in Europe, carved into the rock, is the statue of Decebalus, the Dacian king (86 - 106 AD). This rocky creation is located on the banks of the Danube River, near the city of Orsova, Romania. The sculpture, which is 40 meters high, was completed only five years ago.

Much more ancient and famous statue is the Great Sphinx in Giza. It is believed that the Sphinx was carved out of limestone about 2500 years before the birth of Christ. The world-famous statue depicting a recumbent lion with a human head is 20 meters high and 73.5 meters wide. This sculptural work, like no other, is surrounded by many secrets and legends.

The city of Petra is located on the territory of modern Jordan, 660 meters above the surrounding area, the Arava Valley. It is believed that the city is from 2000 to 4000 years old, it is even mentioned in the Old Testament. This mysterious place was discovered by the Swiss Ludwig Burghart. Today, palaces, temples, tombs, an ancient theater and numerous other buildings have been discovered in Petra, which are very well preserved to our time, and all are carved in stone.

The famous Mount Rushmore is a national monument located in the state of South Dakota, on which the faces of four US presidents are carved: Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Theodore Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson.

Each of them made a lot of efforts for the prosperity of America, so it was decided to build such an original monument in the rock in their honor. Surely, everyone has seen a photo of this architectural work of art or contemplated it in films. Every year, 2 million tourists come to him to look at the unique symbol of the United States.

Mount Rushmore memorial construction

The erection of the monument began in 1927 with the support of the wealthy entrepreneur Charles Rushmore, who allocated $ 5,000 - at that time it was a lot of money. In fact, the mountain was named after him for his generosity.

If you are wondering who is building the memorial, it was the American sculptor John Gutzon Borglum. However, the very idea to build bas-reliefs of the 4 presidents belongs to John Robinson, who initially wanted the faces of cowboys and Indians to be on the mountain, but Borglum was able to persuade him to portray the presidents. Construction work was completed in 1941.

Every day, workers climbed 506 steps to reach the top of the mountain. Explosives were used to detach large pieces of rock. During the period of work, about 360,000 tons of rock were removed. The heads themselves were carved with jackhammers.

It took 400 workers 14 years to depict 4 heads on Mount Rushmore, the height of which is 18 meters, and the total area of ​​the monument reaches 517 hectares. It is very sad that the sculptor could not see the final version of his creation with his own eyes, because shortly before that he died, and his son finished the construction.

Why these particular presidents?

Sculptor Gutzon Borglum, creating a monument, "laid" a deep meaning into it - he wanted to remind people of the most important rules, without which no civilized nation can exist. It was these rules and principles that guided the rulers of the United States, depicted on the mountain, in their time.

Thomas Jefferson was the creator of the Declaration of Independence. George Washington has been immortalized for making American society democratic. Abraham Lincoln succeeded in abolishing slavery in the United States of America. Theodore Roosevelt built the Panama Canal, thanks to which he significantly improved the country's economy and created favorable conditions for business development.

• The inhabitants of the Indian tribe called Lakota live near Mount Rushmore and consider it a sacred place. But they considered the construction of the monument to be vandalism.
• A similar memorial was created nearby, dedicated to the leader of the Indians named Crazy Horse.
• Many films were filmed near the mountain, among which the most popular are: "North by Northwest", "Superman 2", "National Treasure: Book of Secrets".

How to get to Mount Rushmore

Closest to the monument (at a distance of 36 km) is the airport in the city of Rapid City. There are no buses from the city to the sculpture, so you need to rent a car or hitchhike. The road leading up to the mountain is Highway 16A, which in turn leads to Highway 244, which leads directly to the memorial. You can also get to Highway 244 via U.S.16.

Mount Rushmore(Eng. Mount Rushmore, South Dakota) - unique landmark in the USA, it can be safely called a symbol of the country. This is a huge monument depicting busts of 4 American presidents: Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln. Each bust is 18 meters high, the noses are 7 meters long, the eyes are 3.5 meters each, and the mouth is 6 meters.

Mount Rushmore, on the slope of which 4 faces of US presidents are carved

Why these presidents

George Washington - America's first president, supporter of independence, founder of democracy.
Thomas Jefferson - 3rd President, author of the Declaration of Independence. He increased the territory of the state by almost 2 times, conquering and annexing several states.
Abraham Lincoln - 16th President, ended slavery in America.
Theodore Roosevelt, 26th President, received the Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts in concluding the Treaty of Portsmouth. Achieved the expansion of the rights of the working class.

Story

The idea of ​​creating a mountain monument belongs to the historian from South Dakota Dun Robinson. In order to attract tourists to these picturesque places, he put forward proposals to make sculptural images of legendary figures from the time of the conquest of the Wild West, for example, the famous leader and warrior of the Red Cloud Sioux tribe and the leaders of one of the most significant expeditions for America. on the study of the territory of the continent by Meriwether Lewis and William Clark.
But the idea to capture the four presidents there belongs to John Hutzon Borglum, a sculpture that Robinson turned to in 1924 with a request to help in this matter. Borglum liked the idea, but categorically did not want to follow the historian's project, he insisted on the decision to depict on the rocks the faces of four great and significant American presidents of the first 150 years of the country's existence.
Together with his son Lincoln and assistant Tucker, the sculptor went in search of a site for the monument. After seeing the Black Hills, Borglum stopped at Mount Rushmore, 1,700 meters high.
in 1925 the project was approved by the government, but Borglum was able to start work only in 1927. There were funding difficulties. Finally, the government allocated about $250,000 () and work could begin.

The implementation of such a complex idea required great professionalism and physical endurance both from the sculptor himself and from his assistants. The rocks had to be blown up with dynamite, and to do it as carefully as possible, with accurate calculations, so as not to damage the composition. Fortunately, there were no casualties.

The work lasted 14 years, until 1941, but was never fully completed, the huge sculpture still needed to be finalized when the tragedy occurred, in early 1941 Gutzon Borglum died of a heart attack. His son continued his business, but by the end of the year, funding ran out and work was stopped.
The monument even without modifications looks quite grandiose, majestic, and this did not prevent it from becoming a national symbol of America, a place that annually attracts about 2 million visitors.

The sculptor Borglum knew Theodore Roosevelt.
- In 1935, Eleanor Roosevelt, "First Lady" and campaigner for equal rights for women and men, insisted that Gatson create a fifth figure on the mountain, a famous person representing all the women of America. Borglum managed to politely refuse, citing the lack of space on the mountain.
- When the Indian tribes lived on the territory of South Dakota, Mount Rushmore was called the Six Forefathers. In 1930, she was renamed Rushmore. This was the merit of the American businessman Charles Rushmore, who made a large financial investment in the construction of this monument.

Mount Rushmore National Memorial is located near Keystone, South Dakota, USA. Known for the fact that the giant heads of four US presidents are carved into its rock: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln (from left to right). The stone faces of the presidents, dubbed the "sanctuary of democracy", attract tourists and have long been considered one of the symbols of the United States of America.

Before the colonization of America, in the language of the Sioux tribes living in this area, this mountain was called "Six Grandfathers", but was renamed in 1930 in honor of Charles Rushmore, an American businessman - the organizer of the expedition that first visited the area in 1885. He also allocated $ 5,000 for the construction of presidential sculptures - the largest single donation for the United States at that time.

The idea of ​​the "sanctuary of democracy" came to the mind of the historian and publicist Doane Robinson in 1923. According to his idea, this was to become the first monument to the entire political system of the United States, and, in addition, a new fun for numerous tourists. He managed to interest Gutson Borglum. By that time, Borglem was a fairly recognizable artist - sculptor, distinguished by great ambition. Together they began to develop a plan.

Mount Rushmore in South Dakota was chosen as the site for the future "sanctuary of democracy", as it had a fairly even wall. In addition, the rock is turned to the southwest and it was obvious that the sculptures would be well illuminated by the sun throughout the day.

In order to carry out the main work, workers from all over the district were convened. They must blow up the dynamite and give the blocks of rocks a semblance of the shape of a head. This work was not easy, as people had to literally balance on very unreliable scaffolding, and at the same time, with the help of a chisel and a hammer, cut off unnecessary pieces of stone, which is also not an easy task.

Work was constantly interrupted, either due to lack of money (more than a million dollars was required for the entire work), then due to conflicts with the National Parks Administration, which were against the erection of this monument. The weather was often not a help either - it was not possible to work in heavy rains and strong winds, and these elements in the Rushmore area are not uncommon.

Despite all the difficulties in 1930, the opening of the head of Washington took place. Behind him, in 1936, Jefferson was "discovered", in 1937 - Lincoln, and, finally, in 1939, Roosevelt's head was ready. Work on the last president was especially difficult, as it was necessary to depict glasses, which is difficult to do even with a small statue. The sculptor Gatson Borglem preferred Theodore Roosevelt, apparently because he considered the execution of his glasses to be a special artistic boldness.

Initially, according to the author's idea, whole busts of the presidents were to appear in the rock, but work had to start from above, that is, from the heads, after which the work was completed due to the death of one of the authors.
There was another idea that also failed to be implemented - this is the text of the Declaration of Independence of the United States. Borglem wanted to place it just below the figures themselves.
Borglem died at the age of 70, never having completed his grandiose work. His son Lincoln Borglem continued to work on the statues for some time.

Today, up to two million tourists visit Mount Rushmore to admire Borglem's work. Unusual design, large size, harmony with the surrounding landscape. The faces of the four presidents seem to grow out of the rock. Even though the project was supposed to be much larger, there is absolutely no feeling of incompleteness.
The spectacle is impressive: 18-meter statues are visible for 100 kilometers, because the entire “sanctuary of democracy” rises 1,829 meters above the ground. Can you imagine what these heads look like up close?

Despite the fact that the presidents of Mount Rushmore have always been revered as a symbol of Great Power, for some time they were in a very deplorable state - the government did not allocate a cent to the restoration of these monuments. It wasn't until early July 2005 that Karcher, as part of a cultural sponsorship project in collaboration with the National Park Service, began cleanup work.

The task was to remove lichen, algae, moss and other organic contaminants that could damage the rock of the mountain over a long time. Now this company has taken Mount Rushmore under permanent custody, promising to carry out regular maintenance and restoration of the “sanctuary of democracy”. Every year, the faces of the presidents are checked for cracks and damage.

Truly, Mount Rushmore is a real personification of human perseverance and unbending will. A striking sculptural composition of grandiose proportions is the most interesting attraction not only in the state of South Dakota, but throughout America.

Dale Carnegie suggested that every American at a difficult moment in life look at the portrait of Lincoln. Where can I find a portrait of the 16th American President? The most affordable way is to get a five-dollar bill out of your pocket. The most difficult is to hang in a helicopter near Mount Rushmore in South Dakota.

The best view of the "sanctuary of democracy" opens from here - the heads of four American presidents are carved right in the granite of the mountain, including the general strengthening Abraham Lincoln.

The faces of two more are also known from portraits on American banknotes - these are George Washington and Thomas Jefferson. Theodore Roosevelt can be identified by his glasses - they say that it was this circumstance that decided the choice for the sculptor in his favor: they really wanted to solve the difficult artistic task of creating pince-nez in stone.

The Confederates were the first...

The American cliffs have long troubled the imagination of monument building enthusiasts. Mrs. Helen Plain, activist of the Daughters of the Confederation, should be recognized as a pioneer, or rather, a pioneer in this area. No, we are not talking about presidents yet - in 1912, the daughter of the confederation decided to immortalize heroic parents on a colossal bas-relief in a rock near Atlanta, which she begged from the owners for this purpose.

Here, on the stage, or rather, by the mountain, an American sculptor of Danish origin, John Gatson de la Mothe Borglem, a Parisian student and acquaintance of Rodin, appears. Borglem has truly Napoleonic plans - the conceived half-kilometer relief was supposed to be marching infantry, flying cavalry and three Confederate commanders. He started with General Lee and ended with him: the constant nitpicking of the customer eventually forced Borglem to put an end to this project. And move on to another.

Indian history...

The Mount Rushmore Monument began in 1924. Historian and publicist Doon Robinson, with typical American pragmatism, came up with something to attract tourists to South Dakota. Robinson came up with the local heroes and leaders of the Sioux Indians, who from time immemorial lived in the Black Mountains of Dakota, whose name, by the way, is translated from the Sioux languages ​​​​as "friend" or "ally".

To the place and to avoid possible confusion, let's say that the Dakota are an Indian people belonging to the group of Sioux peoples. It is not very clear to whom the Dakota Sioux were allies, but at first the whites were not considered enemies here: back in blessed memory in 1868, the US government assigned the Indians their traditional places of residence and sealed this act with a special treaty, in which they swore that it would be so "as long as the rivers flow and the grass grows, and the leaves appear on the trees."

Six years later, the rivers did not turn back and winter gave way to summer, but the Americans still encroached on the Sioux lands. The stone, or rather the stumbling block, was the gold found in the Black Mountains. People did die for the metal: a war broke out, in which at first the Indians won a victory over the cavalry of General George Custer, completely destroying it at the Battle of the Little Bighorn.

But the victory, alas, turned out to be pyrrhic: as a result, the American troops defeated the Indians, and the leader Crazy Horse was forced to sign a truce. A monument to Crazy Horse in South Dakota will also be erected from a rock - this will be done by Korshak Tsiolkovsky, who took part in the work on the monument on Mount Rushmore, and it's time for us to return from our excursion to Robinson the historian and sculptor Borglem, whom he lured from work on the memorial in Georgia .

Pillars in the mountains

Borglem did not look at the leaders and local "stars", nor did he find it successful that Robinson's idea of ​​sculpting one person at a time from a separate rock. The mature and experienced sculptor had another idea: to sculpt busts of four American presidents on the surface of one mountain. The global project provided for a wide staircase that ran along the slope straight into a huge hall located behind the sculptures. In the hall, one could collect historical relics related to the history of the United States.

The choice of nature took away a lot of strength from the already middle-aged sculptor. After a long and fruitless search, Borglem decided to sculpt the pillars of American democracy in granite. It is believed that the choice was predetermined by the correct orientation of the mountain: it is turned to the southwest, which means that the presidents are illuminated by the sun all day. Don't try to translate the name of the mountain from Sioux or any other language, Rushmore is a family name. The person who wore it traveled around the local places on a business assignment.

The mountain in those years was called "Slaughterhouse". They say that the conductor, who was embarrassed by the dissonant name, when asked by lawyer Rushmore, what the name of the mountain was, thumped with fright that nothing, but it would be called. Is it so, is it not, God knows, but since the 20s of the twentieth century, the mountain has been bearing this name. The mountain with a height of 1829 meters is located on the territory of the Badlands National Park, which means "Bad Lands" - the name is more than wild for the local beauties.

The president is the head...

A permit was needed to work in the National Park, Borglem and Robinson got it, and 360 masons from all over the area set to work. Dynamite, a chisel and a hammer, as well as the rare energy and audacity of the sculptor, and almost a million more dollars, most of which were allocated by the American treasury, as well as the hard and dangerous work of the sculptor's assistants and workers - these are the components of this monument.

To the credit of the construction managers, not a single serious injury, let alone more disastrous consequences, was recorded. And although there were enough difficulties, the weather did not indulge, and the money was allocated with a fight and small portions, nevertheless, in 1930, the head of George Washington was completed.

In 1936 they completed the carving of Thomas Jefferson, in 1937 Abraham Lincoln, and in 1939 they finished working on the head of Theodore Roosevelt. But what about other parts of the body, united by the term "bust"? They didn’t even start, wisely deciding to start with the main thing, and then how it goes.

Time has confirmed the wisdom of the decision: in 1941 Gatson Borglem died. His son Lincoln tried to continue his father's business, but the money ran out, this time irrevocably - the World War left no hope of receiving it.

As a result, the construction of the "Temple of Democracy" cost almost a million dollars (989,995 dollars and 52 cents), of which approximately 80% (856,000) were public funds, and 20% - private donations. Borglem received $170,000 for his work.

Noses cause concern...

Who knows if the Mount Rushmore memorial would have been better if the sculptor had lived longer and translated his grandiose plans into granite? It does not seem unfinished, on the contrary, when looking at it, there is a feeling of complete harmony - neither subtract nor add - so characteristic of masterpieces.

It would be strange to assume that the famous and beloved by the Americans building will remain without the attention of filmmakers. And do not assume this: those who have seen Alfred Hitchcock's 1959 film "North by Northwest" of course remember the scene when the heroes climb the faces of the sculptures.

Moviegoers aside, the monument is seen by an average of two million tourists a year, who arrive here on Route 244 from Keyston or fly from New York to the airport of Rapid City, the nearest city to the mountain.

The presidents were scolded only once, but a thorough one: on July 4, 2005, on Independence Day, several specialists landed on the mountain and cleaned the presidential faces from lichens and dirt for a month.
Every year, the memorial is carefully examined in search of cracks.

Recently, America has been alarmed by the news that the work of Gutson Borglem is in danger, with noses being of particular concern. Fundraising has already begun, and, interestingly, repairs will require, according to scientists, 40 times more than its creation - $ 40 million. inflation, however.

A regiment of applicants arrives ...

From time to time, the question arose of replenishing a number of politicians carved in the rock. The first such proposal was made during the life of Borglem by the wife of the then President, Eleanor Roosevelt: quite in the spirit of American feminism, she demanded that a woman be included in the list. The sculptor then referred to the lack of space. And not so long ago, supporters of ex-President Reagan made an attempt - they emphasize his merits in the victory over communism and economic growth in the era of his rule.