Give the man room

GIVE THE MAN ROOM BY ROBERT J. CASEY

By ROBERT J. CASEY and MARY BORGLUM THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY, INC. Publishers Indianapolis New York Copyright, 1952, by Mary Borglum Printed in the United States of America Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 52-5804 First Edition
To Lincoln and Louella, Mary Ellis and David
Beauty is like a soul that hovers over the surface of form. Its presence is unmistakable in Art or in Life. The measure of its revelation depends on the measure of our own soul-consciousness, the boundaries of our own spirit. —Gutzon Borglum

If you are studying the history of Gutzon Borglum, the place to stand is at Stone Mountain, Georgia.
It is an impressive spot, quiet, little visited, a vast bubble of granite rising abruptly some 800 feet out of a grassy plain, and thousands of feet long. Good roads lead to it from Atlanta. There is, or used to be, a little information office at the foot of its towering cliff, and usually there is someone about to sell souvenirs or to give a sketchy and bewildering account of the mountain’s history. High on the cliff there is a flat place from which several acres of surface rock have been removed; and to the left of the flat is the somewhat unidentifiable head of a man. The guide will tell you that this is the representation of Robert E. Lee, as indeed it might be—Lee or anybody.
There is little left to mark the handiwork of man in this neighborhood. Grass and brush have covered the fallen rock. The scaffolds are down, the tool sheds and storehouses vanished. The steel hooks are gone from the face of the cliff. There are no great funds in the hands of the local patriots. But this is the place. It was because of his work here, because of what he discovered about granite at Stone Mountain, and because of his carving of the head of Robert E. Lee, which today nobody can rightfully attribute to him, that Gutzon Borglum’s memory will be a long time in dying.
Stone Mountain’s story is often repeated and seldom—very seldom—authentic. What you see of the place today is mostly what was here on one dire day in February 1925 when Borglum’s work on it came to an end—forever. But there is much about it that anyone who cares may know.