Mount Rushmore, S.D. – He had trained hard for this day. Now, at 4:30 a.m., the first rays of the morning light began to dance across America’s great grasslands, and he could sleep no more. He slid out of bed and got dressed, nearly bursting with anticipation.
Today, big Jim Manwell would spray boiling water up Abraham Lincoln’s nose.
“This,” said the 47-year-old man with gigantic forearms and a wild, untamed white beard, “is the opportunity of a lifetime.”
Manwell and 14 others began dang ling from ropes onto the granite faces of Lincoln, George Washington, Teddy Roosevelt and Thomas Jefferson last week, lowering themselves from the presidential hair and then blasting away with power nozzles at more than 65 years of dirt, grime, living lichens and pigeon droppings.
The cleansing is the first in the history of the majestic Mount Rushmore, a creation of artist Gutzon Borglum that began in 1927 and came to an end in 1939 when the final face – Roosevelt’s – was dedicated.
Each morning, a pumper truck from the volunteer fire department in the nearby town of Keystone, S.D., arrives at the base of the mountain. The truck parks below the famed faces in an area that – if Borglum hadn’t stopped blasting and chiseling – would be George Washington’s shins.
The pump sends 3,000 gallons of water roaring upward through 630 feet of fire hose, snaking its way over the top, all the way up onto Washington’s wig. Through it all, the father of our country stares off into the Black Hills, seemingly unconcerned with the big hose that is dangling over his right cheek and occasionally flapping against his nose.
Atop Washington’s head rests a 3,000-gallon plastic storage tank, delivered in May by helicopter. Also sitting atop the monument are six heating and pressure-washing machines, each weighing 640 pounds. Five were brought up by helicopter. The sixth was carried, in pieces, by National Park Service workers and reassembled on Roosevelt’s head.
The equipment and much of the labor was donated by Karcher, a German cleaning-equipment company that has conducted other historic grime-removing missions, including a steam bath of the statue of Christ above Rio de Janeiro in 1990 and the colonnades of St. Peter’s Square in 1998.
“This is the most exciting job yet,” said Karcher spokesman and water-sprayer Thorsten Mowes.
Shortly before 6 a.m. each day, a contingent of Park Service workers and Karcher employees begins the long climb up a trail to the top of the monument, climbing around Lincoln’s left ear and then up the back of his neck.
Hoses suck water from the storage tank into the heat and pressure machines. From there, the steaming water is blasted through pressure nozzles held by the cleaning crew. Mount Rushmore buildings and grounds supervisor Al Sage, one of the cleaners, got up close with our 16th president Wednesday.
“It’s an awesome view, man,” said Sage, safely back in his swivel chair inside the maintenance shed. “I got to do Lincoln. I came right down over his nose. You can see the lichen growth and the cracks in the rock. But in general, Lincoln’s nose is in excellent shape. I made it all the way down to his chin and his beard, which are also in good shape.”
Thursday morning, Manwell, an eight-year veteran of the Park Service, got his chance. He, along with Sage and five other Park Service workers, applied for the cleaning duty a few months ago and were trained in mountain-climbing techniques. It’s not Mount Everest, but if you slide off George Washington’s 20-foot-long nose, well, the 500-foot drop to the ground would be nothing to sneeze at.
“You definitely don’t want to have a fear of heights when you’re dangling off one of the foreheads,” Manwell said. “I worked on Lincoln today, and Lincoln’s forehead is more vertical than the others. His and Roosevelt’s. Lincoln’s forehead actually protrudes. Once you pass his eyebrows, you’re just hanging free. Dropping down over Lincoln’s eyebrows is a rush.”
German Jens Kranhold knows the rush. Working alongside Manwell, Kranhold dangled from the Great Emancipator’s left eyebrow early Thursday morning, aimed his steam-blaster at a patch of lichen, pulled the trigger and went soaring backward, the power of the spray leaving him spinning in the wind at the end of a rope.
“It exciting job,” Kranhold said in broken English. “Good job. My job. But water spray push me away from President Lincoln’s eyeball.”
Later, Manwell and Kranhold blasted water inside and around Lincoln’s nose. And at 11 a.m., a voice echoed from the mountain.
“Let’s finish the nose after lunch!” were the exact words that floated down from the heavens. (Here you can make your own joke. Although The Ranger would suggest a punchline that includes the phrase “Cher’s team of plastic surgeons.”)
The workers then hauled themselves back to the top and took a lunch break. Two of them could be seen with binoculars from the base of the monument – eating sandwiches while sitting on Teddy Roosevelt’s head.
Then for Manwell, it was on to the face of Jefferson. He lowered himself onto the forehead of the author of the Declaration of Independence and then down onto his cheek.
“We got a lot done on Jefferson,” Manwell said. “He had black streaks under his eyes. Now they’re gone.”
Down below, thousands of visitors watched the workers. The Park Service had not posted notices about the project, and people were left to figure it out. One of them was Seth Brandt, 12, of St. Louis.
“There’s something on Thomas Jefferson’s nose!” he shouted to his father, Ray, as the two stood on a boardwalk called the Presidential Trail.
Then young Seth’s eyes grew wide.
“Oh, my God!” he shouted. “There’s a guy on his nose!”
And the job of restoring the monument to its original shine goes on. It’s scheduled to last into August. And some of the work won’t be pleasant.
“Jefferson and Roosevelt,” Manwell said, “have pigeon nests in their eyes.”
Staff writer Rich Tosches has spent more than 10 years in Colorado Springs, working first as a columnist at the Colorado Springs Gazette and most recently as a columnist for the Colorado Springs Independent. Prior to moving to the foot of Pikes Peak, he worked at the Los Angeles Times as a feature writer in sports and news and as a reporter with United Press International. He is the author of “Zipping My Fly,” a humorous fly-fishing book. A graduate of Marquette University in Milwaukee, Rich lives with his wife and their five children in Colorado Springs. He can be reached at rtosches@denverpost.com.
