We booked down from Spearfish toward Custer, SD and the Crazy Horse Monument that’s being carved out of a mountainside by a family that’s been working on the same project since 1948.  The sculptor was chosen by the Lakota Indian Tribe almost 60 years ago, and he spent much of his life on the mountain carving Chief Crazy Horse out of the mountain.  So far, his face is finished and stares East across the flat plains.

 

It’s $20 to get it, which seems like a boatload of money until you realize that the carving and the associated museum and cultural center hasn’t taken a single federal dollar as part of the project.  They’re working on his outstretched arm now, and on the face of his horse, but there’s a lot left to carve.  

 

It’s an interesting story, the story of Crazy Horse, who was stabbed in the back by an American Soldier under a flag of truce.  The quote which inspired the sculpture as pictured above is one that came when he was taunted upon arrival.  They asked, “Where are your lands now?” and he pointed off to the East and said “My lands are where my dead lie buried.”