In those days Gutzon Borglum found time to smile once in a while, although anybody who knew the trials of mountain carving might have wondered why. He had been written down for a comfortable part of a million-dollar memorial project. Seldom, during any one carving period, did he get much of it. Some years he got none. People were donating toward Rushmore begrudgingly in nickels and dimes. He was always shorthanded. The experts he needed couldn’t exist on the cash available. Somebody raised the price of electricity. Somebody dismantled the Diesel engine. There were wrangles over concessions and concessionaires and small-town politics. There were road troubles, and supplies were late. And there were other things. The question of why anybody should wish to become a topflight sculptor seemed unlikely to be answered--ever. The head of Washington was officially unveiled on July 4, 1930. The rest of the cliff was unchanged, and Washington’s chin seemed to rest on the ledge from which it had been carved. But when the great flag swung aside to reveal the sculptured face the witnesses, strangers to Stone Mountain, felt that from then on the memorial would never die. J. S. Cullinan, first president of the Rushmore Commission, presided and gave the monument its name: “The authority of Congress to carve colossal portraits of these great men in the granite of the Black Hills has created a perpetual _Shrine_ for political _Democracy_.” And Borglum, tired, dejected, almost conquered by a world where nobody ever seemed to want to do anything, was pleased with that. A head was finished on Rushmore, and the dullest of these laymen looking at it knew that it was a finely done piece of sculpture. He heard someone saying that it would be there forever, and he hoped that it would last longer than Lee’s at Stone Mountain. The crowd at the unveiling got safely back to Rapid City with no trouble at all. And nobody thought of Borglum’s connection with the district’s good roads. In the spring of 1930, trying to get from Rapid City to Keystone with two cars and tow aids, he had been ditched six times. He never got to Mount Rushmore that week. However, he did get to the telegraph office and sent word to President Hoover that the roads were impossible and that he would shut down the project unless conditions were improved and men could get to their work. Hoover sent the message to Governor William J. Bulow, who in turn made an appointment for his state road commission to meet the sculptor that week. Meanwhile the governor telegraphed this message to Mr. Cullinan: BORGLUM HAS THE TEMPERAMENT OF ALL GOOD ARTISTS, GETS MAD WHEN HE CANNOT CONTROL WEATHER CONDITIONS. NOTHING SERIOUS EXCEPT THAT HE GOT A NEW EXPERIENCE AND A NEW TOUCH OF LIFE. AM SENDING HIGHWAY ENGINEER TO SEE WHAT CAN BE DONE. WITH GOD’S AID AND PATIENCE HOPE TO GET HIM SMOOTHED OUT.