Night watching was done by men of the county fire department, and they made it a point to go up before sundown and return after dawn. Trying to come down the mountain at night is a fearsome experience, say those who have done it. Every direction looks the same, and the horizon is just a few yards away, since the rock curves off into space.
The man most closely associated with Stone Mountain in recent years is Elias Nour, whose family operated a restaurant near the foot of the east trail. When Elias was thirteen he let himself be lowered at the end of a rope to rescue a boy who had slipped over the crest and was clinging for his life to a tiny depression in the rock. Since then he has rescued thirty-three more persons who ventured so far down the mountainside that they could not climb back.
A peculiar thing, he noted, is that hardly any of the people he saved ever bothered to thank him. Mostly they seemed embarrassed at having got themselves into such a predicament, and they also appeared to think that saving lives was part of his duties. An exception was a large dog, that clung whining to the rock until young Nour reached his side. The dog behaved perfectly while they were being hauled to safety. Once on top he jumped upon Mr. Nour so suddenly that he knocked him down, then licked his face and neck thoroughly before he was pulled away.
There is no record of the number who have fallen to their deaths at Stone Mountain, but it probably is far over a hundred. Some no doubt were suicides, but the great majority were innocent victims of the mountain’s treachery. The great dome rounds off so smoothly, and the curve downward increases so gradually that the too-venturesome explorer does not realize he is in trouble until he begins to slide, or attempts to climb back up. Then he is fortunate indeed if he can find a tiny crevice or slight depression that he can cling to until help comes down to him from above.
One of the first acts of the new Stone Mountain Memorial Association was to erect a steel storm fence around the rim of the mountain, probably about the same location as the ancient rock wall, as a grim warning that venturing farther would be courting disaster.
FLORA
If you wish to see a Hypericum splendens, you will look for it on the steep slopes of Stone Mountain. This little hardwood shrub, about three feet tall with bright yellow blossoms, is found nowhere else on earth—not even on the similar, but lesser, granite outcrops of the area, in DeKalb and Rockdale Counties.
The Hypericums grow thickest in tiny crevices about halfway up the mountain and most are on the southwest side. None are found at the top nor the bottom. The saucy little golden blossoms with many stamens are about an inch across, and they appear in terminal clusters at the end of branches. Just a few open at a time, so blooming is continuous through most of June and July.
The hardy little plant seems immune to drought and even indifferent to weather. Rain or shine, hot or cold, has no effect on its growth or blossoms. But each plant has a life expectancy of only about three years, after which it dies down completely, to be replaced by descendants coming up from seed.