After arriving in Niland, CA, Leonard finally gave up on his dream of a hot air balloon, but not the dream of spreading his message. In one last attempt to promote his message, Knight began erecting a small 8’ monument of his balloon. After completing it and realizing it wasn’t big enough, he got a bigger idea! Armed with only a bucket, a shovel, and a half a bag of cement, Knight began to create what would become Salvation Mountain along that same ledge.

As time went on, Knight added more cement, sand, and junk that he collected from the dump. After the cement, clay and debris were added, Knight would then decorate the mountain with painted artwork. The mountain featured his famous “God Is Love” and his version of the Sinner’s Prayer.

Days turned into weeks, and weeks into months. Each day, Leonard would put a little more cement and a little more paint on the side of a forgotten riverbank. As his monument grew taller and taller, he would pack old junk he found at the dump onto the side of his “mountain,” fill it with sand and cover it with cement and paint. Cement was hard to come by, so he would mix a lot of sand into it. Leonard’s mountain soon grew to 50 feet and higher.

“I used to spend half a day at the dump to find half a gallon of paint of which only half was usable.” recalled Leonard.

After three years, Knight had added so much sand to the mountain that it collapsed in a huge pile of rubble creating a huge cloud of dust. Instead of accepting defeat, Knight’s optimism once again prevailed as he took the collapse as a positive message from God. Knight reportedly said, “Thank you, God, for taking the mountain down before someone got hurt”. He vowed to begin the monument again, but this time it would be done the “right way”.

Registry