Walk up to the viewing platform at the Black Hills of South Dakota and you'll see them. Four massive heads, sixty feet tall, staring blankly into the distance. It looks permanent. It looks like it’s been there forever. But honestly, the timeline of when was Mount Rushmore made is a lot messier than the postcards suggest. It wasn't just a weekend project. It was a grueling, fourteen-year slog through the Great Depression, involving dynamite, jackhammers, and a sculptor who was, frankly, a bit of a nightmare to work with.
Most people think it’s a 19th-century monument. It feels older, doesn’t it? But the reality is that the drilling didn't even start until the Roaring Twenties were almost over.
The Short Answer to a Long Project
If you're just looking for the dates, here’s the gist: construction began on October 4, 1927. It "finished"—and I use that term loosely because the original design was never actually completed—on October 31, 1941.
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Fourteen years.
That’s how long it took to carve George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln into the side of a mountain. But those dates don't tell the whole story. You’ve got to look at the "why" and the "how" to understand why it took so long and why it stopped exactly when it did.
The Man with the Plan (and a Temper)
The whole thing was the brainchild of Doane Robinson. He was a South Dakota historian who wanted to bring tourists to the state. He originally wanted to carve Western heroes like Buffalo Bill Cody or Lewis and Clark into some granite pillars known as the "Needles."
Enter Gutzon Borglum.
Borglum was the sculptor. He was talented, sure, but he was also incredibly difficult. He rejected the Needles because the rock was too thin and crumbly. He chose Mount Rushmore because it faced southeast, meaning it got the best sunlight for most of the day. Borglum also insisted on carving Presidents instead of local heroes. He wanted the monument to be a "Shrine of Democracy," something that represented the first 150 years of American history.
Breaking Down the Fourteen-Year Slog
Construction didn't happen all at once. It was a stop-and-start nightmare fueled by erratic federal funding and South Dakota weather.
1927 was the beginning. They started with George Washington. It took three years just to get his face looking like a person. They dedicated his face in 1930. Then came Thomas Jefferson. Here’s a fun fact: Jefferson was originally supposed to be on Washington’s right side. They spent two years carving him there before Borglum realized the rock was too weak.
What did they do? They blew him up.
They literally used dynamite to blast Jefferson’s half-carved face off the mountain and started over on Washington’s left side. That’s the kind of "oops" moment you can't really fix with wood filler.
Dynamite as a Fine Art Tool
When you ask when was Mount Rushmore made, you’re really asking about the evolution of 1930s engineering. About 90% of the mountain was removed using dynamite. This wasn't delicate chiseling. The workers were mostly miners who had lost their jobs in the local gold mines. They weren't artists. They were guys who knew how to handle explosives and weren't afraid of heights.
They would "honeycomb" the rock. This meant drilling a bunch of shallow holes close together so they could knock off chunks of granite with a hammer and chisel. It was loud. It was dusty. It was incredibly dangerous, though miraculously, nobody died during the entire fourteen-year process.
- 1936: Thomas Jefferson is dedicated (the second version).
- 1937: Abraham Lincoln is dedicated.
- 1939: Theodore Roosevelt is finally finished.
The Money Ran Out (And So Did the Time)
By 1941, the world was changing. World War II was looming, and the federal government decided that carving giant heads into a mountain wasn't exactly a "top priority" anymore. Gutzon Borglum died in March 1941, leaving his son, Lincoln Borglum, to supervise the final few months of work.
The original plan was much more ambitious.
If you look at the models in the sculptor’s studio today, the Presidents were supposed to be carved down to their waists. They were going to have coats, buttons, and hands. But on October 31, 1941, the money officially dried up. The workers packed up their tools, and the mountain was declared "done." That’s why, if you look closely, the Presidents kind of just... fade into the rock at the chest. They aren't finished. They're just stopped.
Why the Dates Matter Today
Understanding when was Mount Rushmore made helps contextualize the controversy surrounding it. The 1920s and 30s were a time of massive colonial expansion and, unfortunately, a complete disregard for Indigenous land rights. The mountain was known to the Lakota Sioux as "Six Grandfathers." It was part of the Black Hills, land that was promised to them in the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie.
When the carving began in 1927, it was seen by many as a desecration of sacred ground. This isn't just "ancient history." The legal battles over the Black Hills and the monument are still very much alive in the court systems today. In 1980, the Supreme Court actually ruled that the land had been taken illegally, though the Lakota have refused a cash settlement, wanting the land back instead.
Planning Your Visit to the Shrine of Democracy
If you’re heading out to the Black Hills, don't just stare at the faces for five minutes and leave. You’ve gotta get the full picture.
First, go to the Sculptor’s Studio. It was built in 1939 and houses the 1/12th scale models of the mountain. Seeing the models makes you realize just how much is "missing" from the actual mountain due to the 1941 cutoff. It’s wild to see Jefferson’s "waist" and realize they just never got there.
Second, walk the Presidential Trail. It’s about half a mile long and involves a lot of stairs (around 422, so bring water). It gets you much closer to the base of the mountain. From that angle, you can see the "rubble" or the "talus" at the bottom—the 450,000 tons of rock that were blasted off and just left there. It gives you a sense of the sheer scale of the destruction required to make the art.
Third, check the evening lighting ceremony. It happens during the summer months. Even if you aren't a big "patriotism" person, seeing those faces lit up against a pitch-black South Dakota sky is objectively impressive from an engineering standpoint.
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Key Takeaways for Your Trip
- Timing: The park is open year-round, but the best weather is May, June, or September. July and August are brutally hot and packed with crowds.
- Parking: There is a fee for the parking garage. Even if you have a National Parks pass, you still have to pay for the parking because the garage is run by a private concessionaire. It’s about $10.
- Duration: You really only need about two to three hours here. Most people pair it with a trip to Crazy Horse Memorial, which is only about 30 minutes away and provides a very different perspective on mountain carving.
- The Secret Room: Yes, there is a "Hall of Records" hidden behind Lincoln’s head. No, you can’t go inside. It was Borglum’s idea to store the country's most important documents. It was left unfinished in 1941 and finally completed with a porcelain tablet in 1998, but it's closed to the public for safety reasons.
The story of Mount Rushmore isn't just about some guys with hammers. It’s a story of the Great Depression, a sculptor with a massive ego, and a project that was cut short by a world war. It’s an unfinished masterpiece that sits on disputed land, and knowing that makes looking at it a lot more interesting than just seeing a bunch of faces on a rock.