Great White Fathers

Mr. Taliaferro talked about his book Great White Fathers: The Story of the Obsessive Quest to Create Mt. Rushmore, published by Public Affairs. The book tells the story of the monument, its obsessive mastermind, and attempts to create an American heritage. Gutzon Borglum (1867-1941), the sculptor of Mount Rushmore National Memorial, was a contradictory and controversial figure. What began as a personal dream had to be bailed out by the federal government, a compromise that nearly drove Borglum mad, nor in the end could he control how his masterpiece would be received or its devastating impact on the Lakota Sioux and the remote Black Hills of South Dakota. The book is at once the biography of a man and the biography of a place, told through travelogue, interviews, and investigation of the unusual records that an odd American visionary left behind. It shows that the best American stories are not simple; they are complex and contradictory, at times humorous, at other times tragic. close