This past September, I told you my sister Gail and I take a trip together, just the two of us, every five or six years. She lives in Oakland, California and we only get to see each other a couple of times a year during hurried family events. This year we went out West and this is Day 2 of our Adventure.
Crazy Horse is in the middle of the Black Hills in South Dakota and I really didn’t know anything about the place. It began with a New England sculptor name Korczak Ziolkowski who came to help Gutzon Borglum work on Mount Rushmore in 1939 and was invited by Henry Standing Bear (Oglala Lakota Chief) to carve a memorial honoring all North American Indians. Crazy Horse, a war leader of the Oglala Lakota Tribe and one of the greatest leaders in the Sioux resistance to white encroachment on the Black Hills and revered by the Sioux, was the chosen subject.
Korczak started the project in 1948 and did a model sculpture of Crazy Horse sitting on his horse with his arm extended over the horse’s head, indicating “My lands are where my dead lie buried.”
Korczak married Ruth Ross in 1950 and they had 10 children, 4 of which are still working on the project. Many of his 23 grandchildren also work on memorial. The Korczaks have passed away, but their legacy lives on.
Crazy Horse Memorial is the world’s largest mountain carving in progress, and to get an idea of how big this sculpture is, Crazy Horse’s face is 87’ tall and the horse head is 22 stories tall!
My sister and I took the $4 bus trip around the base of the sculpture rather than the $125 tour to the top of the outstretched arm. The bus driver said everyone asks “when will it be finished?” and no one knows — it’s been 68 years working year round. The Memorial project takes no state or federal funding and is funded by park admission — $11 per person or $22 per carload and donations.
The visitor’s center surrounding the mountain carving includes the Indian Museum of North America, the Native American Cultural Center, the sculptor’s studio home and workshop, a huge 40,000 square foot Orientation Center and two theaters. The buildings are something to see with their beautiful wooden interiors. The exhibits include everything from Indian artifacts and artwork, to a full size teepee — with a great gift shop too.
The Foundation has established an Indian University which is a medical training center for American Indians.
During a film presentation in one of the theatres, we saw film footage from when Korczak first climbed up a rope ladder to put in dynamite for the first blasting, up to modern day blasting and carving. His wife Ruth gives a very loving account of her husband’s dedication to this project — his life’s work carried on by his children. One of their sons tells a story about working with his Dad on the mountain one day, both on their CAT bulldozers. The son is on a roadway above his Dad, when he loses control and goes off the edge tumbling 70 feet to the rocks below. Luckily, he jumped free and landed in the only dirt pile at the base. As he got up dusting himself off, his Dad yelled down “You got it down there now you get it out.” He said he did and they still use that bulldozer.
The mountain is mainly granite and they let you dig through the rocks from the blasts stored in a big bin and take whatever you want for free. We talked to 2 young women going cross country from Tennessee all the way up to Canada with 4 kids between them in a mini van. The youngest picked up a big rock and the Mom wasn’t sure where they’d put it.
After we left Crazy Horse we stopped at nearby Needles in Custer State Park. These giant granite pillars are very dramatic tall spires and the one pictured below has an eye — named for the opening created by the elements. For scale I’ve circled a man’s head and shoulder at the base. After a day of sight seeing and picture taking we drove up to Spearfish, about 2 hours north so we could go to Devil’s Tower on Saturday morning. The end of Day 2 of a 9 day adventure. Next time (next month) “Devil’s Tower & Spearfish.”
