Construction of Mount Rushmore Construction of Mount Rushmore The construction of Mount Rushmore National Memorial took 14 years, from 1927 to 1941. Doane Robinson of the South Dakota Historical Society wanted a monument to be built in South Dakota in order to help the economy of the state by attracting tourism. In 1923, he proposed that this monument should be built from the granite cliffs in the Black Hills of South Dakota. Senator Peter Norbeck of South Dakota approved the proposal, and federal funding helped the project. Robinson asked architect and sculptor Gutzon Borglum to sculpt and design the monument. Borglum decided to use
Cornelia Van Auken Chapin had formerly belonged the Gutzon Borglum, with Marion Sanford. In the summer of 1949 she was one of 250 sculptors who exhibited in the 3rd Sculpture International held at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. From 1951 to 1953 Chapin served on the New York City Art Commission. Chapin was most famous for her sculptures of birds and animals, though she also sculpted human figures. Between 1930 and the early 1960s, Chapin exhibited in galleries in New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, California, Washington, DC, New Jersey, Maine, and Paris, and won numerous awards and prizes for her work during the 1930s and