Native America Calling: Mount Rushmore’s troubled history

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Tuesday, April 29, 2025

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Mount Rushmore’s troubled history

This year marks 100 years since Mount Rushmore was dedicated as a national monument.

The stone butte in South Dakota carved with the faces of four presidents has become a patriotic symbol. But the federal government’s broken treaties to take over the land is only the beginning of the famous monument’s troubled history.

Join Native America Calling to hear about Rushmore’s connection to the Confederate South and the ongoing insult of honoring leaders who contributed to efforts to eliminate the sacred land’s original inhabitants.

Land defenders protest the presence of then-president Donald Trump in the sacred Black Hills of South Dakota in July 2020. Photo by Willi White, Courtesy of NDN Collective

Guests on Native America Calling

Nick Estes (Lower Brule Sioux Tribe), assistant professor of American Indian studies at the University of Minnesota

Chief Arvol Looking Horse (Lakota/Dakota/Nakota), 19th Generation Keeper of the White Buffalo Calf Pipe

Matthew Davis, author of forthcoming book “A Biography of a Mountain: The Making and Meaning of Mount Rushmore” (St. Martin’s Press)