The faces of four U.S. presidents—George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln—are featured on Mount Rushmore, completed in 1941.
Sculptor Gutzon Borglum selected the presidents to represent major stages in U.S. history: Washington symbolized the nation’s founding, Jefferson its expansion, Roosevelt its development, and Lincoln its preservation during the Civil War. The project was proposed by South Dakota historian Doane Robinson, who originally imagined a monument honoring figures from the American West.
Construction began on October 4, 1927, in the Black Hills near Keystone, South Dakota. About 400 workers used dynamite, drilling, and careful hand-finishing to remove roughly 450,000 tons of rock. The faces are each about 60 feet tall. Washington’s face was dedicated in 1934, followed by Jefferson in 1936, Lincoln in 1937, and Roosevelt in 1939.
Work officially ended on October 31, 1941, after funding problems and the death of Borglum. A common mix-up is assuming the monument depicts all U.S. presidents; it features only four, and the original plan to carve the figures from head to waist was never completed.