An unfailing support to the sculptor through these difficulties was President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who wrote a dozen or more sympathetic letters. One of them he closed by saying, “I am very much interested in the work you are doing, and will be glad to remove any drawbacks that may handicap you.... With best wishes always....” So it is not surprising that he was present at Rushmore on August 30, 1936, for the unveiling of the head of Thomas Jefferson. He had been touring the West to see for himself the results of desperate drought and had been routed to reach Rapid City on time. At the President’s request the exercises were informal. Flags of Bourbon France and Hapsburg Spain, fluttering from the top of the mountain, were lowered as the huge American flag was swung back to reveal the face of Jefferson. In a few words Gutzon asked the President to dedicate this memorial as a shrine which for years to come would bring people of all the earth to see what manner of men struggled here to establish self-determining government in the Western world. Mr. Roosevelt responded: On many occasions when a new project is presented to you on paper and then later you see the accomplishment, you are disappointed. But it is just the opposite of that in what we are looking at now. I had seen photographs. I had seen the drawings. I had talked with those who were responsible for this great work. And yet I had no conception until about ten minutes ago, not only of its magnitude but of its permanent beauty and of its permanent importance. Mr. Borglum has well said that this can be a monument and an inspiration for the continuance of the democratic-republican form of government, not only in our beloved country but, we hope, throughout the world. This is the second dedication. There will be others by other Presidents in other years. When we get through there will be something for the American people that will last through not just generations but for thousands of thousands of years. And I think that we can perhaps meditate a little on those Americans ten thousand years from now when the weathering on the faces of Washington and Jefferson and Lincoln shall have proceeded to perhaps a depth of a tenth of an inch, meditate and wonder what our descendants--and I think they will still be here--will think about us. Let us hope that at least they will give us the benefit of the doubt, that they will believe we have honestly striven every day and generation to preserve for our descendants a decent land to live in and a decent form of government to operate under.