Monuments & More

Mount Rushmore National Memorial is located in Keystone, S.D., and features the faces of four U.S. presidents: George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln.

Here is a view of Mount Rushmore at sunset.

In July 2005, Mount Rushmore started to get a giant facial. After 64 years, the four presidential faces were getting a high-power makeover. It was expected to take three to six weeks to finish the high-pressure cleaning. The cleaning is not only cosmetic; it is also meant to remove years of growth that eats away at the granite sculpture. Here, Thorsten Mowes washes the face of Thomas Jefferson July 7, 2005.

Thorsten Mowes places one foot on Thomas Jefferson's sculpted eye as he power-washes the eyelid of the granite face July 7, 2005.

Knut Foppe, left, Darin Oestmann, center, with the National Park Service and Thorsten Mowes, right, rappel a scuplture of Thomas Jefferson's face to begin power-washing July 7, 2005.

The freshly cleaned faces of South Dakota's Mount Rushmore National Memorial bask in the early morning sun as the moon sets in the distance, July 22, 2005.

This is Gutzon Borglum, the sculptor who created Mount Rushmore National Memorial, at the dedication ceremonies in Rapid City, S.D., Aug. 30, 1936. It took him 14 years to complete the project.

Fireworks explode over Mount Rushmore during the annual Independence Day celebration July 3, 2005.

Fireworks light up the night sky over Mt. Rushmore National Memorial, S.D., Tuesday, July 3, 2007, during the 10th annual Heartland of America Independence Day Celebration at the Shrine of Democracy.

Badlands National Park is an otherwordly landscape of sweeping buttes, endless canyons and gaping gorges. The park is easily accessible via a 32-mile loop off Interstate 90, less than 100 miles from the heart of the southern Black Hills.

A hiker admires the view at Badlands National Park, S.D.

Visitors view the fossilized remains of mammoths at the Mammoth Site of Hot Springs in Hot Springs, S.D. The site, still an active paleontological dig, now hosts scientists and researchers from across the world, not to mention curious tourists. More than 100 tusks from Columbian and woolly mammoths have been found so far.

The Crazy Horse Memorial is shown in Crazy Horse, S.D. The monument has been in progress since 1948 and is still far from completion. When finished, it will be the world's largest sculpture. At nine stories high, Crazy Horse's head - the only complete portion of the project - is bigger than the four presidential busts featured at Mount Rushmore.

The Crazy Horse mountain memorial is seen in the Black Hills of South Dakota, April 22, 2008. When completed the Crazy Horse mountain carving will be 641 feet long by 563 feet high. The completed head is 87 feet 6 inches high. The horse's head, currently the focus of work on the mountain, is 219 feet or 22 stories high.