At that scale? Sure, I guess. At least for the scale model for the design.
There was some serious engineering going on to pull the real deal off. It’s interesting to look at the techniques and tools they developed for the project.
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I guess i think of the hoover dam for impressive engineering projects from that era.
For mount Rushmore? I have no idea how precise any of it really is. Like did they accidentally blow out an extra foot or two off one of the noses and then just blended it in the rest of the sculpture. It didn’t need to be precise, it just needed to look correct at the end.
The tools part sounds interesting if they solved problems along the way. I’m sure i could learn more than the hardly nothing i know about it.
I don’t think so. A story I recall from my visit to Mt. Rushmore was that when Gutzon Borglum was told that the granite erodes at a rate of 1 inch every 10,000 years he ordered the noses to all be extended 12 inches from the original design. When asked what he was accomplishing by doing so he responded “120,000 years”.
At least, that’s how I remember the story.
As far as the engineering / technology aspect, another thing I recall was that Borglum was a stickler for safety and it was a huge point of pride for him that no one died making the carving… which was unusual for large scale projects in that era. And that some of the safety measures undertaken in making Mr. Rushmore were later adopted elsewhere to keep other workers safe. I don’t recall all of the details.
The most interesting thing about your post is that you managed to disagree with me (on accuracy) but on a completely different basis (intentional stuff predicting erosion) and ended up supporting the idea (no one will notice) anyway.
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I don’t know how precisely it followed the plans, but it looks an awful dang lot like the model they built prior to construction. 
It’s been over 25 years since I was there but the engineering part was really interesting as I recall. My guess is that the actual carving was probably pretty accurate, but slight imperfections won’t be noticeable.
The other thing I recall is that they were quite adamant that all of the rock suitable for carving is used up in the existing 4 faces and there is no possibility of adding a 5th face. It sounds like a significant error would have killed the project. It’s not like they could scrap it and start over.
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It’s small compared to an entire mountain. But like, each eye is 15 feet wide. It’s not really “small”.
They didn’t even finish it. IIRC it was intended to have bodies for each, but they ran out of money and said “fuck it who cares” and didn’t even remove the rubble from underneath.
Yeah, and they had to reposition Jefferson because the rock originally intended to be Jefferson was unsuitable.
Washington was the first one completed and it’s no coincidence that’s he’s got the most body of any President.
But I think when they ran into problems with Jefferson they did plan on scaling back the bodies at that time.
Well now I wish we had 1 giant Washington and 3 chibis.
lol, good to know. The rubble pile has always bothered me a bit.
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Concern in rural Michigan that Chinese investment is bad.
I can vouch that the opponents there are funded by a mixture of conservative think tank donors and the oil/gas lobby, and intentionally confuse the issues. They’re loosely linked with Ottawa Impact, which is one of the larger groups among those who do things like challenge library books for LGBT themes or try to get gay teachers fired for discussing their spouse, because they’re clearly groomers.
You’ll see a lot of signage in areas like this distributed by dark money and put into the yards of people who don’t actually understand the issue beyond “it’s good for Whitmer and therefore bad for Trump, so I hate it.”
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When I was there a few years ago, I saw “Trump 2020” banners and Confederate flags. Place is ripe for this kind of thing.
We seem to have ceded the MI UP to Canada.
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Apparently a few US territories and most of the world are theocracies as well.
