I am glad to see this work being done.

Lincoln was born on April 9, 1912, my first child. (His mother, Mary, was my second wife.) Although we named him James Lincoln de la Mothe Borglum, he quickly became known by his middle name. It is no secret that Abraham Lincoln was my favorite president and the subject of the first sculpture I completed that received wide-spread recognition. That bust was displayed in a store window on Fifth Avenue in New York in 1909, the 100 year anniversary of his birth. It was eventually installed at the U.S. Capitol rotunda.

Lincoln was with me when I picked the location for Rushmore. He was there for every dedication ceremony and helped with much of the work. In fact, he probably spent more time working on the mountain than I did.
It was always Lincoln’s ambition to study engineering back East, but I needed his help with the monument. So in 1933, at the age of 21, I made him a full-time pointer, although he didn’t receive any pay at first. The other pointers taught him everything he needed to know and he became a popular member of the crew. He used to park his car near the hoist house so the operator could listen to baseball scores and telephone the scores to the crew on the monument. In fact, during my occasional temper tantrum, it was Lincoln who was able to convince the crew to stay on.

A year later, in 1934, the Mount Rushmore Commission added Lincoln to the payroll at a dollar an hour, decent pay during the Depression. By 1937, still in his 20s, Lincoln would fill in for me as the Project Sculptor when I was on the road. He had a natural artistic talent, practicing in a variety of mediums, and even sold photographs of Rushmore to the Saturday Evening Post, one of the most popular magazines of that era. In 1938, Lincoln became superintendent of the project, and received an annual salary of $4,800. (I might mention, again, that the other engineers who had held that position all quite after disputes with me. Still, I think my temper has been overstated in the past.)

That’s not to say that Lincoln didn’t have a fiery streak. In 1939, I hired Korczak Ziolkowski as my assistant. He had won the gold prize for sculpting at the World’s Fair in New York and I recognized his talent. But Lincoln and Ziolkowski didn’t hit it off and had some trouble deciding the pecking order at the project. My God, they had worked together for only 19 days when they got into a bitter argument that quickly turned into a physical altercation. Imagine it, two men who were in their physical prime from moving and carving stone. Lincoln was a husky young man but Ziolkowski was a giant. Lincoln’s injuries were substantial enough to require medical attention in town. As a result, I was forced to let Ziolkowski go; I certainly couldn’t have the crew think it was OK to assault the superintendent.

At the time of my death, most of the work had been completed, but Lincoln stayed on to finish the hair on Jefferson, Roosevelt, and Lincoln and do some work on Lincoln’s collar and head. He finished the work on October 31, 1941. It was his decision to not complete the torsos, as represented on the models.

Lincoln wrote three books about Rushmore, including “My Father’s Mountain,” and created a number of religious works for churches in Texas.
He also served as superintendent of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial from October 1, 1941 through May 15, 1944. Like many of the men who worked on Rushmore, Lincoln’s lungs were permanently scarred from breathing granite dust for so many years. On January 27, 1986, he died in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Lincoln loved Rushmore as much as I did. He once said, “I’ve climbed over every inch of that damn mountain and I still get a lump in my throat every time I see it.”

Thank you for your question.

G. Borglum

I find myself spending countless hours each day reading the web logs. I most enjoy South Dakota Watch because of the breadth of its content and the civility exhibited by Mr. Epp. His daily digest of work that he has seen on the internet provides me with a useful road map of worthwhile reading. Mr. Epp has been very kind to me an for that I am grateful.

I also am a frequent visitor to the Dakota War College because I am fascinated with the mechanics of politics and Mr. Powers has provided me with tremendous insight into the workings of a modern day campaign. With that said, I must confess that I still don’t understand what motivates politicians these days. In my prime, most politicians seemed to have a fearless dedication to public service. I don’t believe that is always the case during these times.

I am often amused by the antics of the South Dakota Blog Watch Man. I have tried, like others, to take a guess as to his identity but would be embarassed to share by theories, since I am certain they are incorrect. I have noticed that the South Dakota Blog Watch Man has taken a more serious tone lately — except when he dressed down the youngsters at South Dakota Politics recently — and have come to value his insight.

Beyond that, I must admit that Mr. Bear’s postings at Don’t Worry About The Government have become my guilty pleasure. Although he doesn’t live in South Dakota, most of his posts seem to deal with issues affecting the state, particularly concerning the affairs of Sen. John Thune.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Mr. Hunhoff’s web log that is a companion to South Dakota Magazine. I just purchased the most recent issue of that publication and I would recommend it as a fine periodical, as grand as anything I could create. I was amused by the story about Chislic in the magazine since that was a popular snack among some of the Eastern European workers I employed on and off while carving Mount Rushmore.

The story involving Sen. Thune, a used car dealer from Sioux Falls, and the Meta Bank (what, by the way, is a Meta Bank? I was certain when I first saw the post that it was some sort of typographical error.) It appears that Sen. Thune finds himself standing in a pile of buffalo dung, and I am curious as to whether he will be able to escape the many questions unscathed.

Shortly before I arrived in South Dakota, Sen. Peter Norbeck found himself in a similar controversial position, but he had already left elected office and his problems involved an issue of free speech, so I have difficulty holding in in contempt. Sen. Norbeck spoke out against World War I and found himself charged with sedition, a court action that was later dismissed. Sen. Thune’s alleged malfeasance seems to be of a different color, since he was aiding a friend who may already have been facing financial troubles.

As many of you know, I have faced my own legal troubles in the past. When I parted ways with the Daughters of the Confederacy at Stone Mountain, Georgia, my last act was destroying the plaster models I had constructed to guide my work. These usually sweet-talking southern belles were not amused and I was forced to flee from Georgia to North Carolina with the state police in hot pursuit.

Well, it is time to go. I discovered while on vacation how much I enjoy my afternoon nap and so I will repair to the day bed. I am planning to write something about the new motion picture being filmed about my life, but it might happen on another day.

My hope is that all of you had an enjoyable Fourth of July. I look forward to visiting with you again.

This might sound odd coming from an old man, but does anyone know if Pierre has any hot spots? By that I mean, locations where I might add various comments to this internet site. It’s the only city of any size that I will be visiting, and so I’d like to take the opportunity, during my travels, to update all of you on the happenings at Mount Rushmore.

Come on Epp, let’s start blogging on the merits of real issues and stop running a chicken coup.

I have read stories about this generation’s super sciences, but I was unaware that chickens had evolved so quickly that they are now able to overthrow the government, even with the help of someone as bright as Mr. Epp. I have been using my search engine to try to find further information about this so-called chicken coup that Mr. Sibson refers to, but I can’t seem to find mention of it anywhere.

Until I am notified, I will just hunker down and wait for the worst to pass.

So, I must express my appreciation for the warm reception that Gutzon Borglum Online has received. Foremost, I am appreciative of the kind comments of Mr. Todd D. Epp, who has written twice about my work on his S.D. Watch web log. (Can someone explain to me why I have to type Thunewatch.squarespace.com at the top of my computer to access a web log entitled S.D. Watch? This technology can be so confusing.)

When I learned of Mr. Epp’s identity, I furrowed my brow, for it was a name that I had seen before. Then I remembered that he had written an excellent piece 12 years ago about the filming of North By Northwest at the monument. Epp correctly reported that the curators of the site were concerned about the image Alfred Hitchcock would convey when presenting his film. Although the filmmaker used his creative license to change the surroundings of Mount Rushmore, I still found the movie quite entertaining.

I would also like to thank the South Dakota Blog Watch Man for mentioning my work on his web site. He’s a rather moody fellow, but I do enjoy his web log and I feel fortunate that he hasn’t developed a moniker for me like the ones he uses for other writers, particularly the person he calls the Hillbilly. In my day, that sort of reference wasn’t looked upon kindly, even by actual hillbillies.

Now, as to Mr. Epp’s questions concerning my longevity: My God, man, I am 137 years old, I will do as much as I care to do and as much as I my health allows, and not one bit more.

I read recently that the little microbes growing on the faces cause the monument to decay at a rate of one inch every 10,000 years. The workers who inspected the monument up-close in April said the father of our country was covered with lichen, fungi, moss and bird droppings.

As much pride as I take in the monument, you mght not know that it isn’t exactly the way I originally envisioned it. Initially, I wanted to include a giant inscription on the side of the mountain outlining the nation’s history. It was to be a message to future generations. I rationalized the idea to others by stating, “You might as well drop a letter in the postal system without an address or signature as to send that carved mountain in to the future without identification.” I wanted to put the entablature in the space where Lincoln’s head is currently located and estimated the writer would have about 500 words to complete the task.

The Europeans howled when this was reported in newspapers over there. “The story of a nation in 500 words?” they said.

But I was committed to the idea and had a plan to make sure it happened. When President Calvin Coolidge traveled to the Black Hills in 1927 for a ceremony that marked the completion of an early stage of the project, I used my time at the podium to ask him to write the entableture and told him that it would be signed in stone with his name at the end.

“Mr. Coolidge!,” I told him, “As the first president who has taken part in this great undertaking, please write the inscription to be carved on that mountain! We want your connection with it shown in some other way than just by your presence! I want the name of Coolidge on that mountain!”

How can a politician turn an offer like that down. Cool Cal might have known that he would probably never get his face on the side of a mountain, but his name was a nice consolation prize. He readily agreed.

An aside: Has anyone considered changing the name of Ellsworth Air Force Base to the George W. Bush Air Force Base? Who knows what might massage the president’s ego?

Anyway, one of Coolidge’s last official acts as president was the signing of Public Law 805 which established a commission. The law read: “The commission is to complete the carving of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial, to consist of heroic figures of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Roosevelt, together with an entablature upon which shall be cut a suitable inscription to be indited by Calvin Coolidge.” The bill also provided a quarter million dollars for the project.

But then disaster struck. We discovered that while working that the stone surface where we had planned on placing Jefferson would never support his massive forehead. So we had to move Jefferson to Washington’s left — ha ha, how is that for political irony — and we no long had room for the entableture on the face of the monument.

I didn’t give up on the idea immediately, however. My idea was to write the inscription in English, Latin, and Sanskrit, a language my wife Mary had studied. It would serve as a new Rosetta Stone, aiding future scholars in unraveling the mysteries of our languages and helping to decipher them. I proposed putting the entablature on the backside, so that if faced what is now the Hall of Records.

The president sent me a copy of his first two paragraphs, and I did a little bit of good-natured editing. Then I released the work to the general public and suddenly every booze-filled newspaper editor in the country was a literary critic. They mocked the president to the point where I was forced to step forward and admit that I had done a little bit of tinkering. Coolidge withdrew from the assignment.

A year after the president died, in 1934, I asked newspaper publisher William Randolph Hearst to publicize the contest in his chain of journals. He agreed and even said that he would offer cash and scholorhips for prize. Alas, the Rushmore Commission expressed reservations because the law expressly stated the Coolidge must write the text. Helloooooo, he’s dead.

Luckily, the contest was announced in the Hearst papers before the commission could officially act. The commissioners wisely decided to keep the legal issue quiet and deal with the problem if it came up.

Meanwhile, President Franklin Roosevelt accepted Borglum’s invitation to head a judging committee to include Eleanor Roosevelt, Interior Secretary Harold Ickes, and other VIPs. The contest was extremely popular (one estimate put the number of entries at 100,000) and Mt. Rushmore was national news.

The judges named winner in several age groups. The college edition winner was William Burkett of Nebraska. His scholarship allowed him to go to college and he later became a successful businessman in California. I was pleased when he later said that he owed his success to the Rushmore Entablature Contest and wished to be buried near the monument.

When I received the bundle of winning entries by post, I was horrified and rejected them all. I decided that if you want to get something done, you have to do it yourself and began working on the text myself. But when World War II broke out, Congress was in no mood to provide me with the additional funds necessary to carve the entablature and so the idea was shelved.

I carved big things my whole life. My sculpture of Abe Lincoln’s head can be found in the Capitol Rotunda and was carved from six tons of granite. In 1908, I won a contest to carve a statue of General Philip Sheridan in Chicago.

In 1915, the Daughters of the Confederacy hired me to carve a 70-foot statue of Gen. Robert E. Lee into the site of Stone Mountain, Georgia, a project financed by the Ku Klux Klan. It didn’t take me long to realize that Lee would look like a postage stamp on the side of Stone Mountain and so I convinced them to include Jefferson Davis, and ‘Stonewall’ Jackson riding around the mountain, followed by a legion of artillery troops.
After a delay caused by World War I, I began work on this unprecedented monument. After finishing the detailed model of the carving, I was unable to trace my ideas onto the massive area onto which I was working, until I developed a gigantic magic lantern to project the image onto the side of the mountain. I was so damn clever back then.

Carving officially began on June 23, 1923 Lee’s head was unveiled on Lee’s birthday January 19, 1924. It was magnificent, but I started bickering with the old bags in the DAC soon thereafter (although I never had much trouble with the fellas in the KKK). Eventually, I gave up on the project, smashed my model, and left. My work was cleared and Augustus Lukeman completed a similar project.

The good news is that the sculpting bug had bit me and I was anxious to try another large-scale piece. That’s how I ended up in South Dakota.

Doane Robinson came up with the idea for Mount Rushmore and initially suggested that it include Washington and Lincoln. But because the monument sat in the center of lands that we, how shall I say, acquired from the Indians, we decided to include Jefferson, too. Afterall, Jefferson was responsible for the Louisiana Purchase and for the Lewis and Clark Expedition, and without him, we wouldn’t own the hills. Some say that Teddy Roosevelt was added as an acknowledgement of Manifest Destiny, but to be honest, I thought we needed another face up there and knew that if we put up a monument to T.R., it would really tick off North Dakota.

Much of the work at Mount Rushmore was overseen by my son Lincoln while I was traveling the country raising funds for Mount Rushmore. Lincoln finished the season after I died in Chicago in 1941 after complications from surgery. Lincoln cleaned up the work a little, but left it the way I did, which is to say, “marvelous”.

I am buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery in Glendale in the Memorial Court of Honor. My dear wife, Mary Montgomery Williams Borglum, is interred alongside me.