Photos

The official Inauguration Day was January 20th. However, as that date falls on a Sunday in 2013, the public swearing-in ceremony will be held today, Monday, January 21, 2013.

For this special day Mount Rushmore National Memorial is the most appropriate photo from my collection.

There are many ways to draw inspiration from Mount Rushmore National Memorial, one of the nation's most consequential and enduring patriotic symbols. Just consider - the work of this massive carving, the largest monument in the world, was accomplished during a time of great national challenge and hardship - the Great Depression of the 1930s.
Between October 4,1927, and October 31,1941, Gutzon Borglum and 400 workers sculpted the colossal faces of U.S. presidents George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln to represent the first 150 years of the great experiment in democracy that is America.

The Four Presidents:

George Washington (1732-1799) our nation's first president led the Continental Army during the American Revolutionary War. He is considered the father of the country; thus he is the most prominent figure on the mountain. "Government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force. Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master."

Thomas Jefferson (1734-1836) was the author of the Declaration of Independence and America's third president. He doubled the size of the country with the purchase of the Louisiana Territory in 1803. "A wise and frugal Government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned-this is the sum of good government."

Theodore Roosevelt (1858-1919) our nation's 26th president led a burgeoning United States into the 20th century. Known as the "trust buster" he worked to ensure the rights of common man. "The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living and the get-rich-quick theory of live."

Abraham Lincoln (1809-1865) considered by many the nation's greatest president held the nation together during the Civil War. "America will never be destroyed from the outside. If we falter and lose our freedoms, it will be because we destroyed ourselves."