Heroes

We wound into Custer State Park on the narrow, sometimes corkscrewing roads through Keystone, WY, twisting around pigtail bridges and threading needle-like tunnels, some with just one lane. Our destination for the night was a camp site Laura nabbed early that morning at Center Lake.

CSP is one of the cleanest, well managed parks I've ever visited. As we began to visit points of interest we learned how the current park embodies the vision of Peter Norbec, a mover and shaker in the time around the Great Depression. Nearly all of the literature and information about Custer State Park makes reference to Mr. Norbec, elevating him to the status of local hero. And of course the park is named for a famous/infamous general, hero to many.

A main attraction in the park is, of course, Mt. Rushmore. Four American heroes, past presidents, gaze down on the park from a mountain.

We set out the first full day at the park to the great faces in stone close up. We had caught glimpses of them artfully framed in the narrow tunnels. With a good view from the road as we approached the Memorial we elected to move on to Crazy Horse up the road.

Crazy Horse Monument has a great premise: that Native American peoples have heroes, too. I enjoy several ironies with this project. Most obvious is that Crazy Horse is much larger than the four American presidents combined -- with a wink the Native Americans may be laying a larger claim on the lands captured and sculpted to a different cultural sense. More profound is the immensity of the process involved in carving the likeness of Crazy Horse in a mountain and creating a Native American Cultural center. After six decades Crazy Horse has a face. No completion date is set. The process, which will take several lifetimes, is just as important as the result. This in counterpoint to the results-driven reshaping of the land by our peoples.

I look for personal connections with these sites. I found an unexpected one at Crazy Horse. The Native American leader died on September 6, 1877 from a knife wound in the back by an American Soldier. The man (a European American)Karzac Ziolkowski recruited to carve the mountain monument was born on September 6, 1908; this was considered an omen by those who sought him out to begin this enormous project.

So, with my birthday also on September 6, I suppose I naturally take my encounter with Crazy Horse personally.

We had a great three days in Custer State Park, and I have a lot to think about.