Family Faces a Mountainous Job

--For 40 years, until his death in 1982, Korczak Ziolkowski faced a monumental task. Ziolkowski, a sculptor, labored at Thunderhead Mountain, in the Black Hills of southwestern South Dakota, to carve a towering 563-foot-tall, 641-foot-long statue of Sioux Indian leader Crazy Horse. Now, Ziolkowski’s family, widow Ruth, 60, and seven of her 10 children, are attempting to finish the awesome project. “He’s here. There’s no question about it,” said Ruth, who is overseeing the work. “This is his place. Without him, it wouldn’t be here.” The family, which is marking the 40th anniversary of Ziolkowski’s start of his dream, does not know when the project will be completed. Only a rough outline is now visible. Chief Henry Standing Bear, who approached Ziolkowski to erect the monument, had written: “My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man had great heroes too.” The monument will show Crazy Horse seated on a horse, pointing east to the plains. And it is estimated that a 10-story building could fit between Crazy Horse’s outstretched arm and the horse’s neck. Ziolkowski, who was 74 when he died, is buried at the foot of the mountain. But one of his daughters, Dawn, said: “He’s not over there in that tomb. His spirit is here.”

--On a smaller scale, Alma, Ark., has erected an eight-foot concrete and fiberglass statue of Popeye in preparation for its first Spinach Festival, starting Friday. “There was a few of us sitting in a coffee shop one morning, trying to come up with something Alma had that nobody else has, and we kept coming back to spinach,” said George Bowles of the Merchants Assn. The town, which contends that it is the spinach capital of the world, will also hold a Sweet Pea crawling contest for babies. But Bowles warns: “If they get up and walk, they’ll be disqualified.”

--Residents in Cambridge, Mass., meanwhile, are taking a new interest in their streets and buildings. They have enthusiastically joined in the town’s Trivia Hunt, a search for historical buildings, archways, cupolas, windows and other structures. The hunt began last month and ends Saturday, and it is sponsored by the Cambridge Historical Society, which has put together 4,500 booklets, describing the sites to look for. “It’s terribly addictive,” Minka van Buezekom said. “It’s gotten so bad I don’t need the book any more. I’ve got everything memorized. Everywhere I go I keep looking.” George Potter, a retired Cambridge resident, suggests using a bicycle. “It takes you out and gets you some exercise,” Potter said. “It sharpens your observations. You get to know the different kinds of architecture, the different kinds of bricks, all kinds of things.”