If you are planning on visiting Mount Rushmore this year, then it might be interesting for you to know these 10 facts about Mount Rushmore, before you get there, so that you know something about this National Memorial before you arrive.

Many people just know that there are 4 President’s heads carved into the side of a mountain in South Dakota, but don’t know anything else about the site, and you can learn a lot at the National Memorial in the museum, visitors center and sculptors studio, but it is also good to know a few facts about a place before visiting.

1) Over 2,000,000 people visit Mount Rushmore every year

In 2023, Mount Rushmore had 2,430,000 visitors to the site, with July being the busiest month. In July 2023 there were over 624,000 visitors to Mount Rushmore, with over 32,500 visitors recorded in one single day!!

The busiest few days at Mount Rushmore is always around 4th July, there are special events put on and you can even see the 4 presidents walking around the site.

It is the most popular tourist attraction in South Dakota and the reason that many people choose to visit South Dakota, though there are many other great attractions in the state. Mount Rushmore you can visit in half a day, so make sure to see some of the other attractions near Mount Rushmore.

2) It took 14 years to finish Mount Rushmore

Mount Rushmore was started in 1927 and completed in 1941, with around 400 men working on the project. As the government were financing and overseeing the project, the original vision for the project was not completed as money ran out.

It was decided that they would no longer show the Presidents from the waist up and only complete their heads, as the money was running out. In the sculptors studio you can see the replica from which they worked from to create the heads on the mountain and here you can see what it was originally supposed to look like, with the Presidents from the waist up.

Surprisingly knowing how bad health and safety was at that time, no one died during the construction of it, though the sculptor himself died following complications after surgery just 8 months before the end of the project.

3) Mount Rushmore is located close to another Mountain Carving

Mount Rushmore is located just 9 miles away from Crazy Horse Memorial, though by road it is around 16 miles. Mount Rushmore had already been completed and opened to the public before Sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski started the project at Crazy Horse in 1948.

Korczak Ziolkowski actually worked on Mount Rushmore for 19 days as an assistant but after an argument with the sculptors son he left. When completed Crazy Horse will be much bigger than Mount Rushmore, though after 76 years of work, it is no where near completion and many people wonder if it will ever be finished.

4) Mount Rushmore was built to increase tourism in South Dakota

The reason that Mount Rushmore was built was to try and boost tourism in South Dakota and give people a reason to visit the state. Historian Doane Robinson came up with the idea of carving faces into the rocks of the Blackhills to bring more visitors to the area.

Originally the sculptor Gutzon Borglum was not interested in the project, but after some time, Doane Robinson persuaded Borglum to come and visit the Blackills for himself.

It was during this visit and being impressed with the Blackhills that Borglum decided he was onboard with the project, to promote the history and the culture of the American West.

While Robinson concentrated on getting government funding for the project, Borglum worked on the design and logistics of carving such a huge sculpture out of the mountainside and in the Sculptors Studio, you can see the scale replica he built to carve the mountain.

5) Mt Rushmore was named after a New York Lawyer

In 1885 a New York Lawyer named Charles Rushmore was surveying gold claims in the area, he was very impressed with the Blackhills and about one particular granite peak that stood above the other neighboring peaks and he asked one of the local men and what it was called.

They told him that it had no name and one of the others and one of the men said “We will name it now and name it Rushmore Peak”. Over the years it has been named Rushmore Peak, Rushmore Mountain and Rushmore Rock.

Charles Rushmore was told that sometime after this conversation it was recorded in the Land Register as this name but it isn’t until 1930 that it was officially recognized as Mount Rushmore.

6) 450,000 tonnes of rock was removed from the mountain

More than 450,000 tonnes of rock was removed from the mountain while creating the carving and 90% of the work was done using explosives, rather than by hand.

This you can still see as the big heap of rock at the base of the mountain. Though in the past small amounts have been sold as a souvenir to tourists who have visited the memorial.

7) The sculptor never saw the project finished

The sculptor of the project Gutzon Borglum died aged 73 from surgery complications just under 8 months before Mount Rushmore was completed.

At this point the carving was nearly completed and there were just a few finishing off jobs that needed to be completed, which were overseen by Gutzon’s son Lincoln.

Lincoln managed to finish the project as per his fathers designs and wishes and it was officially finished on 31 October 1941, when it was transferred to the National Park Service.

8) It cost $1m to create Mount Rushmore

It cost just under $1m to create Mount Rushmore which today would be the equivalent of $17m, which I think is quite cheap for this kind of project. I can’t believe that hiring 400 men for 14 years, plus all of the equipment needed could be done for that amount of money.

I think if it was built today, then it would certainly cost a lot more money, the wages of the men working there for 14 years would certainly be more than $17m and with Health and Safety, it would certainly cost a lot more money with the equipment that would be needed to it safe, but those were different times.

The depression in the US was from 1929 to 1941 and many of the men working on the mountain were just grateful to have a job and some money coming in. It didn’t matter what the job was, how hard the job was, they were just grateful to be working.

In 1991 they spent $40m on the renovation of Mount Rushmore and each year in the fall, restoration work is done of the faces.

9) Fibre Optic Cables monitor the faces for cracks

Did you know that there is 8,000 feet of camouflaged fibre optic cable that has been installed around the faces of the presidents, to help monitor the 144 hairline cracks around the faces? Every Fall, restoration work is done on the faces, with a team, getting close up to the faces to look for and fill any cracks they may find.

They do this to help preserve the mountain for future generations and to make sure that no part of the mountain crumbles away and so that for the forseeable future, the mountain will look the same as it does today.

10) A 5th head was nearly added

In 1937 when three of the heads had been completed, a bill was introduced to congress to add the head of Susan Anthony a leader in women’s rights, but congress passed a bill saying that only the heads that had already been started could be completed.

This is because the project had run out of money as the US, like most of the world was in the middle of a financial crisis and there wasn’t money to spare on these types of projects. Even the project wasn’t finished as it was originally designed as only the heads of the Presidents were completed and not down to their waists.