Then an investigation was launched, to determine why there was no light on the mountain. The foreman on the job brought out his work sheet, showing how he had checked off each item—the poles, bolts and braces, the insulators, the wire, the socket, and the final item, he had turned on the electricity. But the list given him had contained no mention of a light bulb, so he had not screwed one in! Until the new recreation hall and observation tower were erected the only construction on top of the mountain in recent years was a 60-foot-high forest fire-watcher’s tower, manned consecutively by two women. They drove up every morning and down in the evening along the foot trail by Jeep before any semblance of a road was made, and never had a mishap. If a thundercloud approached, they came down in a hurry, to reach the bottom before the storm bombarded the mountain with lightning. [Illustration: This photo shows Elias Nour actually rescuing a dog that slid part way down the mountain.] 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.