Mount Rushmore Mount Rushmore(6,000 ft), in South Dakota, became a celebrated American landmark after sculptor Gutzon Borglumtook on the project of carving into the side of it the heads of four great presidents. From 1927 until his death in 1941, Borglum worked on chiseling the 60-foot likenesses of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln, and Theodore Roosevelt. His son, Lincoln, finished the sculpture later that year.