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For centuries, men have wondered about why Stonehenge, that great circle of incredibly large stones in England, was created. Some said it was a giant Bronze Age calendar created to honor the sun and moon gods. Others said it was a Druid temple. Last week, however, the noted Oxford professor of archeology, Dr. Milton Furbisher, revealed the truth: Stonehenge is a 4,000-year-old race track and casino.
"Do you see those two pillars near the center?" he asked me as we toured it together. "There were once four of them and we thought that they represented the four seasons of the year. Now we know that they were actually the places where the four cashiers had their booths."
"How did you figure that out?" I wondered.
"From the great number of coins discovered in the ground. Apparently they were not only cashiers, but rather careless ones at that. There are coins there from all over the ancient world -- and from places as far away as Gaul, Egypt, Mesopatania, China, and Israel. The pennies from Scotland are the most interesting --often, you can see the indentations from where they had been pinched."
"And over there," Furbisher said, "is a spot which confused us at first. From the great number of long, blonde, hairs we found there we suspected that it was a bar where local tarts picked up the winners. But later we found out why all the blondes hung out there: It was a blackjack table which allowed you to "triple down" your bet if you took one card when you were holding 21."
"How come there are two separate trails leading in -- one wide and one narrow?" I asked.
"The wide one leads down to a river," the professor told me. "Gamblers used to arrive there by boat and walk up the path. It was made fairly wide because of all the stores along its side. We found twin arches in front of one of them and an ancient statue. We thought we had discovered a Bronze Age idol, but then one of our American students pointed out that it was actually Ronald McDonald."
"And the narrow path? Didn't it have any stores?"
"Absolutely not," said Furbisher. "It was used by people who were leaving the casino -- and they, of course, had no money left. In fact, that's why they didn't walk back to the river; they couldn't afford the boat fare."
"What about the winners? There must have been some," I said.
"Apparently Stonehenge was operated by an ancient tribe from the Island of Sicily," said Furbisher, "and for some reason the winners seemed to disappear. However, we did discover some skeletal remains set in concrete at the bottom of the river."
"What was that?" I asked, pointing to a large, flat, stone with a round end.
"That is very interesting," Furbisher said. "Most of the rocks in Stonehenge are bluestones from Wales or sandstones that probably came from Avebury. However, that one rock is lodestone and probably came from much further away. As you know, lodestone is magnetic and we discovered it has some very interesting effects when a roulette wheel is placed on the round end."
"You mean the Stonehenge casino operators were crooked?" I asked in astonishment.
"Yes," said Furbisher. "They were the spiritual ancestors of the owners of The Sadists' Online Casino."
"You mentioned a race track," I said. "Where was it?"
"It is that large path which encircles Stonehenge," he told me. "We discovered its purpose when we found some parchment pieces which turned out to be parimutuel tickets. We also did laboratory tests on some brown stones and found that they were actually fossilized horse manure. These, of course, were of higher value than the tickets."
"I have to admit," I said, "this is rather disappointing. For years I had imagined the ancient Celts dragging these stones for miles in order to pay honor to their gods. Now you tell me that they were just interested in a crap game."
"Why is that so surprising?" Forbisher asked. "People are people no matter when they lived. Where do you find the most interesting buildings in the world today? Jerusalem doesn't offer a 'Circus Circus'!"
"Still, I would have liked to believe that they were spiritually motivated."
"Of course they were!" exclaimed Forbisher. "Where do people pray more than they do in casinos?"
"But tell me," I asked. "Why, after all the work they went through putting up Stonehenge, did they close it down?"
"That leads us to the most interesting archeological discovery of all," said Forbisher. "Stonehenge Casino went bankrupt because of the competition."
"You mean that someone built a bigger and better casino somewhere else?" I asked. "Then how come we have never discovered it?"
"Because it was an INVISIBLE casino," the professor said.
"You mean..."
"Yes," said the professor. "Not too far from here we discovered some Bronze Age huts. Each had a little table next to a wall. We thought that this was a holy altar of some kind but now realize that it was a pre-historic computer table. Instead of going to Stonehenge, people started to gamble online!"
"That's impossible!" I sputtered. "If the Internet existed 4,000 years ago, what made it disappear?"
"I'm not quite certain," the professor admitted, "but it seems that a company called 'PrehiSoft' came out with a new operating system that kept crashing and civilization collapsed as people did nothing except sit around pressing 'Control, Alt, Delete.'"
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