Stone Mountain – A Confederate Mirror to Mount Rushmore

When it comes to massive granite carvings, Mount Rushmore gets all the attention – but it’s certainly not the only one. In fact, the largest bas-relief sculpture in the world sits just outside Atlanta, Georgia. Stone Mountain is bigger and – in some ways – older than Mount Rushmore, and it’s more controversial to boot.

The Stone Mountain Memorial

In 1912, C. Helen Plane, one of the charter members of the United Daughters of the Confederacy, envisioned a massive memorial to commemorate Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee by carving him into the side of Stone Mountain. The family that owned the property at the time, the Venables, deeded the north face to the organization in 1916 for the creation of a Civil War memorial.

They hired Danish-American sculptor Gutzon Borglum for the project in 1915. That name may sound familiar to those who have studied Mount Rushmore, which came later. Borglum cautioned, however, that a bust of Lee would look “like a postage stamp on a barn door” – it would be too small to be noticed on such a grand granite canvas. And so was born a much grander design, that of an entire army marching across the mountain led by notable Confederate leaders. Ultimately, however, it was scaled back to just three men on horseback: Generals Robert E. Lee and Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson and the Confederacy’s president, Jefferson Davis.

Although the plan was conceived in the early 1910s, construction didn’t begin until 1923. But by 1925, Borglum, after a dispute with the managing association, left the project. That was when he went on to design and lead the sculpting of Mount Rushmore.

Augustus Lukeman took over and blasted away Borglum’s initial work with dynamite to get a fresh start. But he  worked only until 1928, as funding ran out when the Great Depression began.

Stone Mountain sat untouched for the next 36 years.

Carving resumed in 1964 under sculptor Walter Hancock and chief carver Roy Faulkner. The memorial was officially dedicated in May 1970, and the finishing touches were completed in 1972.

Big Rock, Big Picture

When it was done, the bas-relief sculpture measured 90 feet by 190 feet, sitting 400 feet above the ground. General Lee is as tall as a nine-story building, and a grown man could stand inside the ears or mouths of the horses. While Mount Rushmore is big – and while the heads carved into it are larger than the heads on figures in Georgia – Stone Mountain does feature a larger overall depiction and bigger figures in general. In fact, it is the world’s largest bas-relief sculpture, spanning three acres compared to Mount Rushmore’s 0.25.

Today, Stone Mountain is one of Georgia’s most visited attractions, attracting millions of guests each year. Like Rushmore, however, it has a complicated past. In 1915, the modern Ku Klux Klan held a “rebirth” ceremony on the top of the mountain. And because the monument is dedicated to leaders who fought to secede from the Union and preserve slavery, Stone Mountain remains a hotly contested monument. Some argue such figures shouldn’t be honored at all.

1. Stone Mountain in Georgia is the largest bas-relief carving in the world.
2. Stone Mountain depicts Confederate President Jefferson Davis, General Robert E. Lee, and General “Stonewall” Jackson.
3. The same man who designed Mount Rushmore, Gutzon Borglum, started Stone Mountain, though it was finished by Walter Hancock.