Why South Dakota? Why make a massive sculpture of men's faces? Why those men in particular? Who could possibly mastermind such a marvelous work and exactly how could something born of imagination become a real work of art? Above all, for what purpose would anyone choose to undertake this? So many questions go through my mind contemplating the remarkable monument of Mount Rushmore.

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             Mount Rushmore resides in the Black Hills of western South Dakota. In 1868, at Fort Laramie, the United States military signed a treaty with the Sioux tribes acknowledging Sioux ownership of the Black Hills region which ended Red Cloud's War, a series of Indian raids on white gold mining settlements. The Black Hills was home to the Lakota Sioux and it held a special significance to them. Legend says that the mountain was part of a trail that the Lakota leader Black Elk took on his spiritual journey. (Wikipedia.com) However, the US military seized the range after a series of victorious battles known as the Great Sioux War or Black Hills War. Gold prospectors flooded the area and violated the treaty by crossing the reservation boundaries in search of the precious mineral resources once again, following the nationally telegraphed findings of the Custer and Newton-Jenny Expeditions. The United States struggled to keep the boundaries secure and stem the tide of gold crazed miners. (Wikipedia.com) .

             The Sioux sent a delegation party consisting of prominent tribe leaders Red Cloud, Spotted Tail, and Lone Horn in an attempt to persuade President Grant to honor the treaties regarding their lands. The President and Congress buckled under political pressure and condescendingly offered $25,000 for the land and the right to relocate to a new Indian territory in modern-day Oklahoma. The delegates scoffed at the offer and Spotted Tail added his own sly remark. "You speak of another country, but it is not my country; it does not concern me, and I want nothing to do with it.