A true air adventure is a learning experience, from that first flight, right up to that 10,000-hour flight. If you want a real learning experience, read on. Get your sections out (WAC CF-17 & Cheyenne) and look at Southwestern South Dakota near Rapid City. This area is full of great scenery, natural and man made. It is certainly worth a flight to see.

Rapid City sits in the middle of many favorite vacation spots. The highlight of your trip will, of course, be Mount Rushmore. All of us have seen pictures of it. Folks, the mountain is much more magnificent when standing in front of the work of art by Gutzen Borglum. This stone monument began with the first drilling on August 10, 1927. President Calvin Coolidge was present for the event. On February 1929, Public Law 805 was approved. It created the Mount Rushmore Memorial Commission. The bill provided $250,000 of government matching funds. The donations came in slowly and stopped with the crash of the 1929 Stock Market. Borglum was determined that the monument would continue. Many times he was the only one working on it due to the lack of funding.

It wasn’t until 1934, that amended legislation provided for funding by direct appropriation, not matching funds. From then on, until the project closed in November of 1941, all funds for the monument came from direct appropriation by Congress. Once the government assumed the entire financial burden, the work was halted only when weather demanded. The monument was projected to cost $400,000 and take four years. In the completion of the monument the cost was one million dollars and it took 14 years. Of those 14 years, there was no work going on at the site for 7.5 of those years according to Lincoln Borglum the sculptor’s son. Work on the project was continuous year round when money was available. Only a few days in the winter were cold enough to stop the work. The Mount Rushmore memorial commission functioned under the National Park Service, Department of the Interior, later to be returned to the National Park Service.

The last drilling on the faces took place on October 31, 1941. The project was not completed to the point Borglum had planned. It is, however, a “Monument for the Ages.” Due to his untimely death, lack of funding and World War II, the project was completed to the point it is today. Thus a “Monument for the Ages” is complete. Several dedication ceremonies were planned but never held. It wasn’t until 1991, when President George Bush dedicated the monument.

Borglum died, as a result of a minor operation, while on a trip to Chicago on March 6, 1941. His wife, daughter, and son were with him at his death. He was born in 1867, near Bear Lake, Idaho.

President George W. Bush made a visit to Mount Rushmore on August 15, 2002, to celebrate the 75th anniversary of Coolidge dedication. Displays of the ten-gallon hat, chaps and boots presented to President Coolidge were on display from August 12th through August 18th. Also, a saddle made for President Calvin Coolidge and one for sitting President George W. Bush, by the Black Hills Stock Show Foundation, were also on display. President Bush has been invited to attend the ceremony and accept his saddle.

Crazy Horse Monument
Only seventeen miles away is another work of art for the ages is in progress. This is the Crazy Horse Memorial started in 1948, by Korczak Ziolkowski. “My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, too” Sioux Chief Henry Standing Bear wrote those memorable words in late 1939 to Sculptor Korczak Ziolkowski. He was invited to the Black Hills of South Dakota to carve a mountain memorial to Crazy Horse.* Thus began the carving of a mountain by one man. Fifty-four years later you see in the photo what has happened. Korczak died in 1982. His wife, who was eighteen years younger and seven of their ten children continue his work today to complete the Crazy Horse Memorial.

This project, unlike Mount Rushmore, has not had one penny of government funding. It was Korczak’s belief the government would never complete the project if they had control. Therefore, he kept the project going by the money derived from the curious who came to view the progress. Today the same applies. The nine dollars per person I paid to get in seemed high, but I know where it was going to be used. That makes me a part of the Crazy Horse Memorial (and of course we must count the sixty dollars of items I purchased from the gift store). This family operation is going to complete the project Korczak began while in his forties.

Korczak worked a short time with Gutzon Borglum on Mount Rushmore. He left the Rushmore project after a spat with Borglum’s son, Lincoln. Mount Rushmore, by comparison to the Crazy Horse Memorial, is small. All four heads on Mount Rushmore would fit into the head of Crazy Horse. Korczak planned to have his project completed on both sides, unlike Rushmore. When Korczak died in 1982, the face was not completed. That happened in 1998. Korczak had planned to finish the horse’s face first. His wife decided, after his death, that the face, which is smaller than the horse head, would be easier and faster to finish.

I can remember reading about this project in the 60’s and 70’s. All that was behind Korczak in the photos was a mountain with some blasting taking place. My thoughts at that time were, “…this guy is crazy. He will never finish the carving.” Well as it appears, he didn’t, but his family most likely will. It was a pleasure to be part of this on going work of art. As with Rushmore, it takes a dream and the power of a dreamer to succeed.

When the Crazy Horse Monument is completed, the areas around the carved mountain will contain a Native American Museum, a medical training center, and a University. Judging from the number of visitors there on the Monday morning that I went, the project makes money today. If that money is spent on the mountain, the carving will not take another fifty years. I would like to attend the dedication of the completion. Perhaps it will come in my lifetime.

NOTICE AIRPLANE IN PICTURE >>>>>

Crazy Horse Memorial has received many generous gifts of construction equipment and materials over the years. Such equipment has served the Memorial well, but they face a constant challenge of replacing aging equipment. The mountain crew is still using donated equipment that is 30 or more years old. As mentioned earlier, they get no federal money. If you would like to learn more about the Crazy Horse Monument go to www.crazyhorse.org

South Dakota Air & Space Museum
The Air & Space Museum is located seven miles east of Rapid City, SD on I-90 at Ellsworth Air Force Base. The admission is free. It is a unique opportunity to view aviation history as you stroll among the twenty-eight aircraft and missiles on display. You can walk around General Eisenhower’s personal B-25 transport from World War II, see a Minuteman II Missile Launch Control Center and experience what life was like for missile crews. Some of the aircraft on display include:

A-7D Corsair II F-84 Thurnderstreak
B-25 Mitchell Bomber F-86 Sabre
B-26 Invader F-101 Voodoo
B-29 Superfortress F-105 Thud
B-47 Stratojet L-5 Sentinel
B-52D Stratofortress T-33 Shooting Star
C-47 Gooney Bird T-38 Talon
C-54 Skymaster U-3 Blue Canoe


Badlands & More
You will enjoy the Badland Petrified Gardens. The Badlands were named by the French trappers who explored the west in the early 1800’s called the area a “bad land” to cross. The Dakota Indians labeled it the “mako sica” meaning land bad. Today we call the area the Badlands. It was once home to three-toed horses, saber-toothed cats and giant pigs. Badlands National Park contains some of the world’s richest Oligocene fossil beds. Today, the park’s ancient formations and sprawling prairies are home to bison, pronghorn and prairie dogs.

Other attractions around Rapid City, South Dakota include:

Devils Tower National Monument, Black Hill’s National Forest, Adams Museum & House, Rushmore Cave, Big Thunder gold mine, Cosmos Mystery Area, Flags & Wheels Indoor Racing, Rushmore Borglum Museum, Matthews Opera House (built in 1906), and Wall Drug Store.

You ask what is so important about a drug store??? That is what I asked. Located in Wall, SD, just a few miles from the Badlands is Wall Drug Store that dates back to the 20’s. The biggest drug store you’ve ever seen. It contains four art gallery dining rooms with two hundred ten original oil paintings, a Western Mall with twenty-six shops, a mechanical Cowboy Band, six-foot Jackalope, and an animated T-Rex.

To get to Rapid City, SD (RAP) by air look on the Cheyenne Sectional eight miles southeast of the city at an elevation of 3202’. The airport is in operation 24 hours a day. The tower is open from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. The tower frequency is 118.7; ASOS is 117.525 (phone 605 393.2832) Approach is with Ellsworth AFB 119.5 on runways 14/32 (8,701’ x 50’). Rental cars agencies Hertz, National, Budget, Avis, limousine are available on the field. There are three FBO’s on field.

Have a safe and fun flight.

*Carving A Dream, by Robb Dewall

Note: Read Mack's Hangar for more information on this subject.

“….. it takes a dream and the power of a dreamer to succeed.”