Mount Rushmore National Memorial, national memorial authorized in 1925. Located in southwestern South Dakota, in the Black Hills, the memorial features the heads of United States presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt carved into a granite bluff. The massive sculpture was carved into the rim of Mount Rushmore 150 m (500 ft) above the valley floor and are each 20 m (60 ft) tall. The memorial cost nearly $1 million to create. The idea for creating the sculpture in the Black Hills came from South Dakota historian Doane Robinson in the early 1920s.

Washington peaking from behind the granite bluff

American sculptor Gutzon Borglum designed the memorial and supervised its construction. Borglum envisioned a monument to the growth of the United States and its most important leaders and chose Mount Rushmore as the site. Borglum’s original design was a sculpture of the four presidents down to their waists. Construction of the memorial began in 1927. The head of Washington was completed first, followed by Jefferson and Lincoln. Roosevelt’s head was unfinished when Borglum died in 1941 and his son Lincoln completed the work later that year. Borglum’s studio, located near the memorial, displays plaster models and tools used in creating the statues. Administered by the National Park Service. Area, 517 hectares (1,278 acres).

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Needles Highway, Black Hills

Black Hills, mountainous region in the western United States, in northeastern Wyoming and western South Dakota. The average elevation of the region, which occupies an area of 16,000 sq km (6,000 sq mi), is 1,200 m (4,000 ft). Harney Peak (2,207 m/7,242 ft) in South Dakota is the highest point. To the northeast of Harney Peak is Mount Rushmore (1,745 m/5,725 ft), also in South Dakota, site of the Mount Rushmore National Memorial. The region is drained by the Belle Fourche and Cheyenne rivers. On the slopes of the Black Hills are heavy stands of timber, mainly conifers. Nearly 4,900 sq km (1,900 sq mi) of the forested areas are managed as a national forest. The region is one of the richest gold-mining districts in the United States and contains a wide variety of other mineral resources, including silver, lead, copper, tin, iron ore, coal, petroleum, salt, mica, and gypsum.

one of the needles

The Black Hills were once part of a Sioux Native American reservation. However, the Sioux were forced out of the region after gold was discovered there in 1874. In 1980 the Supreme Court of the United States ruled that the Sioux should be paid $122.5 million in compensation and interest for the seized land. However, the Sioux have consistently resisted accepting the money because they still want their land returned.

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Wind Cave National Park

natural entrance to the cave

The cave is well known for its outstanding display of boxwork, an unusual cave formation composed of thin calcite fins resembling honeycombs.

boxwork

The park's mixed grass prairie is one of the few remaining and is home to native wildlife such as bison, elk, pronghorn, mule deer, coyotes, and prairie dogs.

 

prairie dog

Family group of Bison in South Dakota

male Bison

Bad Lands National Park

badlands

The Badlands are a work of art still in progress. Water and wind continue to sculpt the pliant soil into sharply eroded buttes, pinnacles, and spires that resemble medieval castles made of sand. It's in the golden light of sunrise or sunset that the artistry is on full display, when the duff-colored soils glow in shades of red, pink, and purple.

Located in southwestern South Dakota, Badlands National Park consists of 244,000 acres of sharply eroded buttes, pinnacles and spires blended with the largest, protected mixed grass prairie in the United States.