The Georgia Guidestones explosion deprived visitors of Elberton granite skill

We can see evidence of this in ancient religious or burial sites, or in buildings from ancient civilizations. Examples of these monuments, memorials or buildings can be found throughout the world and can range from many hundreds to several thousand years old.

Stonehenge, on the Salisbury Plain in England, is one of those ancient sites. Archaeologists estimate that Stonehenge was most likely built in stages, anywhere from 3100 to 1600 BC.

According to archeologists, Stonehenge was most likely originally built for religious or burial purposes, tied to pagan rituals.

However, since there is no writing or carvings on the stones, the actual purpose of the stones, the site and who built them remain unknown.

What is known is that people have been visiting the site for thousands of years. Today, Stonehenge is a protected UNESCO World Heritage Site as well as a major tourist site for visitors from around the world.

Guidestones was once a word-of-mouth roadside oddity

Credit: Elberton Granite Association

Credit: Elberton Granite Association

Elberton, Georgia, is located two hours northeast of Atlanta, right on the border with South Carolina. What makes Elberton noteworthy is the vein of granite it sits on and the availability to quarry this granite.

Since the 1870s, Elberton has been quarrying granite for building projects, and since 1900, Elberton has been producing monuments and memorials. During its over 150-year history, Elberton granite has been used in buildings, monuments and memorials around the country.

The Georgia Guidestones, unveiled in March of 1980, and people were quick to notice their similarity to Stonehenge, and they were dubbed “America’s Stonehenge.”

For the next 15 years after being unveiled, the Guidestones were just a word-of-mouth roadside oddity, and the people in Elbert County paid little attention to them. However, as the internet began to take hold in the mid-1990s, the Guidestones began to take on a life of their own. They developed an almost cult-like following, and they attracted thousands of tourists from around the world.

Unlike Stonehenge, the Guidestones had writing carved into them. The writing consisted of 10 guides for humanity, written in multiple languages, which in the event of a cataclysmic event with a large loss of life, could be used to guide humanity responsibly, learning from the mistakes of previous generations. It was this writing which would ultimately doom the Guidestones.

Landmark elevated local craftsmanship and drew tourism

As the internet allowed people to exchange thoughts and ideas in real time, people began to question the meaning of the Guidestones and to make assumptions about what they thought they meant or were intended for. The most prevailing thought was that they were part of a new world order that called for mass genocide. There was no evidence of this, other than what a reader might interpret from the writing on them.

For everyone who hated the Guidestones, I could find an equal number of people who loved them. They brought tourism to a rural Southern town, and they showcased the type of craftsmanship that is available in the Elberton granite industry.

Ultimately, however, the words on the stones proved to be too powerful for some people to handle, and on July 6, 2022, a domestic terrorist placed an explosive device at the base of the stones and destroyed them forever. In that act, what did that terrorist deprive future generations of?

If the Guidestones had survived for thousands of years, just like Stonehenge has, would those future generations have praised the builder for helping to guide humanity back from destruction and making the world a better place? Would the Guidestones be a protected site that would still attract people to come and learn from its words?

Now, imagine that someone didn’t like Stonehenge for what it stood for, because of its history as a place of pagan rituals, and then decided to blow it up.

Christopher Kubas has served as the executive vice president of the Elberton Granite Association since 2014.