MT. RUSHMORE July 3rd

After leaving the Badlands we were back on the highway to Rapid City, SD and the Black Hills. We arrived at Mt. Rushmore. I hadn’t remembered it from on our way back from Alaska way back in 1989, I think. It is very beautifully built up with pillars for each state leading up to the balcony looking up at the 4 heads. On the way we passed (and had photos taken with) Mr. Lincoln and Mr. Washington. Later I saw “Teddy Roosevelt” in an auditorium talking and Thomas Jefferson telling stories outside. They looked pretty authentic.

Jefferson telling a story

Old George was a bit stiff!

Lincoln was very tall.

Nick Clifford who worked 

I also spotted a sign that said one of the workers on the monument was in the bookstore, signing autographs. I bought the Q and A book from Nick and got a picture taken with him. He worked on the monument for 3 years and his wife helped write the book in Q and A format based on years of questions tourists asked him in the bookstore. I think he’s about 92 now. Interesting story.

We then drove around to see the Crazy Horse monument that’s barely started, although you can see a profile of the head and it will be a full sized mounted-on-a-horse statue. We didn’t pay to go in but did a u-turn and snapped a couple of photos.

Kissing Wild Bill Hickock in Deadwood

We headed north towards Spearfish where we were staying the night. On the way we pass through Deadwood and stopped and had a beer in the saloon where Wild Bill Hickock was shot, holding aces and 8s (now called Deadman’s Hand in poker) at 39. He is buried in Boothill, part of Mt. Moriah cemetery next to Calamity Jane (Martha Jane Canary Burke), who was notorious in the old West. Something I read said she asked to be buried next to Wild Bill, but he couldn’t stand her. She claimed after he was shot that they had been lovers and fathered one of her children. Friends buried her next to him as a joke, so he’d have to spend eternity next to someone he couldn’t stand!!

I think she also traveled with Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West show.

Spearfish was an okay small town to spend the night at Bell’s Inn.