Mount Rushmore: Myths, Legends, and Facts

This book is about Mount Rushmore. Mount Rushmore is a giant mountain with four presidents’ faces carved into it: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt. This book talks a bit about the Gold Rush and the Great Sioux War. In the 1800s when settlers began moving west, they took over most of the land that belonged to American Indians. The government gave a piece of land, a reservation, to the Sioux tribe. The reservation included The Black Hills. A few years later, gold was discovered in the Black Hills so the American government took the land back away from the Sioux.

This book has a lot of interesting facts. The original idea for the carving didn’t include presidents, they were going to carve western heroes. Most of the carving was done with dynamite, not picks and drills. The design had to be changed many times because the rocks cracked, were too soft, or had other problems.

I really liked the book because it gave facts about how the land was taken and how the monument was built. After reading Mount Rushmore, I am mostly sad that it was built. It wasn’t fair how the land was taken from the Lakota Sioux and it ruined the beautiful mountain. But a little part of me thinks it is a nice tribute to four good presidents.