White Cliffs and Red Men

Distances between civilizations are so vast in the West a driver needs to be mindful of how much gas is in the tank.  Erin and I are driving on the highway through the scrubland of southern Montana.  Yellow fields of dried grasses undulate up and over the bumpy moraines.  Aside from an advertisement for fireworks and oil rigs dipping their beaks into the dirt, there is nothing around for at least a hundred miles until we reach the battlefield of Little Big Horn where Custer made his last stand against the Lakota, Cheyenne and Arapaho tribes. 

There are certain names and events from history that we can name but don’t remember why they should be so well-known.  I had heard of General Custer and his famous last stand, but I didn’t know why anybody was fighting, especially over such a hot, desolate patch of land that seems habitable, but unbearable.  Rows of tombstones are embedded into the hillside where Custer and many others died.  It is a shame that he is the one who is remembered, especially considering he lost the battle. 

The Native Americans were being forced to settle into a reservation like penned animals.  The tribes were a nomadic people who believed the land was tame and bountiful, so they broke the white man’s rules and fought one final war for their freedom to roam the land as they have done for so long. 

We may be forced to memorize Custer’s name in our history classes, but the Crow Indians living on the nearby reservation are forced to remember how close they were to retaining their lifestyle.  The battlefield is only a few miles away from a reservation that consists largely of ramshackle trailers and pick-up trucks.  I reasoned that people who used to live in teepees wouldn’t mind living in such small houses, but nevertheless the neighborhood didn’t seem a place I wanted to move to.

The dominance of white history over Native American history is probably never as prevalent as it is in South Dakota.  In the small town of Keystone, a sculptor named Gutzon Borglum carved the faces of four presidents onto a cliffside.  Most people learn about Mount Rushmore before they realize it’s in South Dakota.  Before Borglum started carving, I doubt there was much reason to visit the state as a tourist, and I still don’t know why he chose to carve the memorial in such a remote place.

Mount Rushmore is one of those places Americans feel impelled to visit to merely say they’ve visited.  We have all seen pictures and know what to expect before paying our entry fee.  Many people remark that the sculpture is smaller than they thought it would be, but that is only because the cliffs are far away from the central viewing area.  The memorial is undoubtedly a fine piece of art well worth a visit.  I was mostly surprised by the casual atmosphere within the National Monument.  I did not have to go through security, and nobody stopped me when I stepped off the paved trail to climb an adjacent cliff to get closer to the presidents’ faces.

 

After browsing through the gift shop in which every piece of memorabilia looked the same but made with different material (a cotton T-shirt or plastic magnet), we drove to the Crazy Horse statue outside of Custer, South Dakota.  I had read about the statue and was curious to visit such a large monument that not many people know about.  The fee to get inside is twenty dollars per person, but the money helps the family continue sculpting, as they refuse any state or national support. 

The sculptor, Korczak, was an assistant on Mount Rushmore.  Once that project was completed, he was approached by a chief who asked him to build him a memorial for his people.  The chief wanted the white man to know that the red man has heroes, too.  In the 1940s, Korczak started the project, which he would soon spend his entire life building.  At the start, he lived in a small tent and carried his equipment up rickety stairs.  His generator would often quit on him, and he would have to walk all the way down the massive staircase and back up again only to have the machine quit again. 

Korczak and his wife had ten children, and when they grew up they too devoted their lives to the completion of their father’s dream.

The family planned to create the world’s largest sculpture along with a museum and a university all designed for the commemoration and benefit of Native Americans.  Since so much had been taken from the tribes, Korczak felt assured he was devoting his life to a worthy cause that could help heal wounds and design better futures for the Native Americans.

The majority of the cliff was carved by dynamite.  The workers could blast a piece of rock so accurately that they could aim the explosive range within a few inches.  It took nearly forty years just to remove enough rock to even glimpse the overall shape of the memorial.  A miniature sculpture reveals Crazy Horse sitting atop his horse with his arm pointing toward the distance.  This monument’s location, unlike Mount Rushmore, makes sense because Crazy Horse is pointing toward the Black Hills, where his people have lived and died.  Unfortunately, Korczak died in the 1980s well before the face of Crazy Horse was completed, but he finished the designs, which are still being used today. 

The face is now finished, and the arm that stretches toward his people’s land is nearly complete.  Crazy Horse’s head is as large as Mount Rushmore, but it is difficult to conceive the colossal size of this monument because you can’t get very close to it unless you take a bus tour to the bottom of the cliff.  You cannot walk up to it because there are construction vehicles lying around.  The memorial is still in progress and will be for quite some time.  The site, although unfinished, is a more humbling experience than Mount Rushmore, only a few miles up the road. 

A single family has been working on this for over seventy years by their own means for a people whose monuments are often overshadowed by the white man’s.  It is inspiring to know that there are people out there who won’t give up for what they believe in, even if it means carving a rock they won’t see finished in their lifetime.  And the monument may not even be complete within my life either, and I’m not very old yet.  This is the first time I have ever considered my non-existent grandchildren.  Crazy Horse may be finished by then.

After the sun sets and the sky turns black, there is a laser show projected on the unfinished monument.  I assume this will tell the tale of Crazy Horse and at least mention the Battle of Little Bighorn, but there is no such thing.  Wiry pictures of Native Americans glow against the rock while a voice from a speaker talks in generalities about what gifts the Native Americans introduced to the whites.  I saw pictures of corn, moccasins, and roaming bison running in place.

Someone gets into their truck, turns on the engine and beams their lights into my eyes.  I mutter an expletive at him and make a remark about being disrespectful, but after a few more minutes of this haphazardly thrown-together, glorified PowerPoint presentation, I don’t blame the man for leaving early.  The laser show is bizarre, an obvious gimmick to keep people around long enough to justify the expensive entry fee. 

I want to learn more about Crazy Horse and this behemoth of a project.  I am inspired by the sculptor’s story and the legacy his family is carrying, but this laser show seems contrary to the family’s dream of ensuring that the white man know the red man’s heroes.  I drive away, disappointed in the childish light show, thinking that this place could have so much more potential, but like many of the reservations it is trying to represent, is in need of funds but doesn’t want any handouts.  At the least, they need a storyteller so that people can recall a name and know why it’s worth remembering.