Carving Size

The Stone Mountain Confederate Memorial Carving is huge. It covers an area of about 300 feet wide and 190 feet high.

However, the actual carved area is 160 feet wide and 76 feet high. That means only about twenty-one percent of the carving is occupied by the men and their horses. The rest of the area is rough.

Consider the scale of the carving. The head of Robert E. Lee on Stone Mountain is sixteen feet high. Borglum's head of Lee on Stone Mountain was about 24 feet high. But the head of George Washington at Mount Rushmore is sixty feet high!

Gutzon Borglum's carving of Robert E. Lee superimposed on finished carving

Close-up of Borglum's work over the completed carving

Finished carving at Borglum's original scale

Stone Mountain's carving is often said to be bigger than Mount Rushmore's. Let's examine this claim. As we've seen, Stone Mountain's carved figures are contained in a large frame which is, in fact, larger than the overall size of Mt. Rushmore. And although Mt. Rushmore has a much larger scale, it only contains heads while Stone Mountain depicts much of the bodies as well as the horses. Stone Mountain's carved figures are taller but Mt. Rushmore's are wider. So which one really is larger? Check out the following actual-size comparison and decide for yourself.