MAMMOTH CAVE INATIONAL PARK

By MARGARET M.BRIDI)ELL THE

STORY OF

MAMMOTH CAVE NATIONAL PARK

KENTUCKY

A Brief History

by MARGARET M. BRIDWELL

Drawings by fhe Author ,1

FRONT COVER—HINDU TEMPLE IN MAMMOTH CAVE Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky

COPYRIGHT 1952 MARGARET M. BRIDWELL MAMMOTH CAVE, KY. "Established, dedicated and set apart as a national park for the benefit and enjoyment of the people. "^

^ni^odi UCLLOnill

Mammoth Cave National Park has a long and interesting history due to a number of factors not d ordinarily associated with a primarily scenic region. First, the trespass of man makes history and this area, even though it is primeval enough to make it of national importance, has been inhabited by white man for nearly two hundred years. Second, the abun­ dant evidences of pre-historic man in the locality are of sufficient archaeological importance to justify their recording. Third, the geographic location of the region has been of prime national importance histori­ cally from the middle of the eighteenth century when Kentucky was America's western frontier and the park area itself a challenge to adventurers, hunters and landgrabbers, to the present day when it has become the nearest national park to the center of population of the United States. Fourth, although the cave for­ mations in Mammoth Cave follow the natural cave processes of all limestone caverns, the presence of great amounts of saltpeter mined in the caves during the War of 1812 influenced the victorious outcome of the war, thus making the cave itself of great national historical significance. OLD MAMMOTH CAVE HOTEL, FROM ORIGINAL DRAWING BY FERDINAND REICHARDT, 1857 I wish to thank Mr. Thomas C. Miller, Super­ intendent, Mammoth Cave National Park, for the splendid cooperation, valuable time and con­ stant encouragement he gave me in compiling this brief history; Mr. W. W. Thompson, White­ haven, Tenn.; Mr. Max Nahm, Judge John B. Rodes and Mr. James N. Mines, Bowling Green, Ky.; Mr. Ellis Jones and Mr. Lute Lee, Cave City, Ky.; Mr. J. J. Ryan, Mr. Thomas E. Owen, and Mr. H. T. Lively of the L h- N Railroad Company; Mr. Ronald F. Lee, Asst. Director, National Park Service; Mr. Courtland T. Reid, Naturalist, Mr. Martin L. Charlet, Chief Guide, and Mr. Carl Hanson, Guide, Mammoth Cave National Park; Mr. H. S. Sanborn, President, National Park Concessions, Inc., and Mr. James Rosenberger, Lexington, Ky., each of whom contributed books, records or personal informa­ tion without which the story of Mammoth Cave could not have been written. I also wish to thank the National Park Service, Mr. Ray Scott, Photographer and Mr. J. Welling­ ton Young, Assistant Photographer, National Park Concessions, Inc. Mammoth Cave National Park, for the use of all the photographs in this book. HISTORrC ENTRANCE TO MAMMOTH CAVE THE STORY OF MAMMOTH CAVE NATIONAL PARK

Geographical Setting Geological Formation Flora and Fauna

Mammoth Cave National Park, near the center of population of the United States, occupies a most advantageous geographi­ cal location. It lies one hundred miles south of Louisville, Kentucky, and one hundred miles north of Nashville, Tennes­ see, and is within a day's drive of forty million people. Dis­ covered, according to tradition, by a hunter named Houchins who chased a wounded bear into its entrance. Mammoth Cave's subterranean wonders and natural scenic beauty were first shown commercially in 1816, and since that time have been among America's outstanding attractions. Two beautiful navigable rivers, the Green and the Nolin, flow through the park and the wide variety of soil within its boundaries, together with ample rainfall and temperate climate, has resulted in the development of a wide variety of flora. Along the trails and river bluffs several hundred species of flowers and thirty-one varieties of ferns may be seen from early spring to late fall, and more than 100 different types of trees and shrubs, primarily deciduous, with some pines, cedars and other evergreens make up the forests. Near the Nolin River is the Big Leaf Magnolia, and the most promi­ nent of the small trees and shrubs are the flowering dogwood and redbud. The flora of Kentucky represents the original appeal and present prosperity of the state as there is little doubt that the rich grassland and magnificent timber of the region furnished the chief reason for its early settlement. Kentucky enjoys a most fortunate position geographically and physiographically as a bird region and there are now about 180 species of birds in the park. Among them are the catbird, bluebird, cardinal, woodthrush, quail and robin. The great ornithologists, John James Audubon and Alexander Wilson were drawn to Kentucky on account of its countless numbers of birds, and Audubon wrote at great length of the unbelievably large roosts of the passenger pigeon, now extinct, on the banks of the Green River. Under the protection of the National Park Service wildlife in Mammoth Cave National Park is rapidly increasing. Com­ mon tj^es of animal life in the park are the red fox, mink, raccoon, opossum, gray squirrel, rabbit, muskrat and wood- chuck. Beaver, deer and wild turkey have been restocked. Mammoth Cave is noted for the blind or eyeless animals that have adapted themselves to living, generation after generation, in the total darkness of the cave. The first blind cave animal known in the world was the Mammoth Cave Blindfish, dis­ covered about 1838 in Echo River. These fish became the subject of extensive study and discussion after the first de­ scription of them was published in 1842. Among the more than fifty species of animal life that have been found in the caves are blind or eyeless crawfish, cave crickets, beetles, spiders, snails and worms. Bats and woodrats live in the cave but come out regularly and are not true cave animals. The chief attraction of Mammoth Cave National Park is Mammoth Cave itself, over one hundred and fifty miles of which have been explored and charted. In addition, there are many other, though smaller, caves in the area. The caves are located near the center of the karst region of Kentucky, a large area drained almost entirely by underground streams. The limestone in which the caves are excavated was de­ posited on the floor of a shallow, inland sea, a sea that covered Kentucky during the Mississippian period of geologic history, some 240,000,000 years ago. The formation of the caves is the work of water in two rather distinct phases. The erosional phase took place below the water table and was effected by ground water dissolving the limestone along joint and bedding planes, ever enlarging the cracks thus formed until large passageways and rooms were hollowed out. An upward movement of the earth's crust in this region drained the caves by lowering the water table and allowed Green River, the major surface stream in the area, to start its present course of downcutting through the limestone strata. Underground tributaries of Green River, fed from the sinkholes that were now developing on the sur­ face, modified the cave passageways in many instances. Echo River, largest of these streams, is over 300 feet below the surface, and is probably the most famous underground river in the world. 8 After the caves were drained the second phase of cave development began, that of building the decorative forma­ tions. Surface water, working its way down through cracks, dissolves some of the limestone, and eventually emerges on the cave ceiling. There the water evaporates and the lime­ stone is deposited. More water brings more deposition until stalactites are built downward. Excess water falling to the floor builds stalagmites upward. Many fine examples of stalactites and stalagmites are to be seen in Mammoth Cave, the largest and more famous being Frozen Niagara. Mammoth Cave is also famous for its gypsum—depositions of which occur in dry areas in the form of soft cottony-like masses, long needles, curved flower clusters, and crystal studded masses. Gypsum cave formations were first dis­ covered in Mammoth Cave, and Dr. John Locke of the Ohio Medical College published the first description of them in 1841.

PREHISTORIC AND ABORIGINAL HISTORY Mammoth Cave was formed in the Tertiary epoch of the Cenozoic era. Since Tertiary time covers the period from one to 58 million years ago, the cave is "many millions" of years old. At the time of the last Ice Age mammoths, masto- dens, giant sloths, hyenas and ancient horses roamed over Kentucky, fossils of some of which have been found in caves of the Mammoth Cave area. The history of man in Kentucky probably goes back to the Neolothic man who knew the use of fire, made a crude kind of pottery, fashioned rude ornaments and weapons from bone, wood, and shell, and buried his dead. He and his descendants left abundant records in the form of burials, campsites, mounds, refuse heaps, fortifications and cultural objects as mute but irrefutable evidence of their habitation in the region in prehistoric times. Archaeological studies indicate that a number of different Indian groups lived in the Green River and Mammoth Cave area hundreds of years prior to the coming of the white man. Some of these prehistoric groups have been designated as the River People, the Kentucky Cliff Dwellers, Mound Builders, and the Mammoth Cave Indian. Indians remains are found throughout various sections of the United States but Mammoth Cave is unique in that the Indian went so far underground. At Carlsbad evidences of prehis- toric Indians are only found at the cave entrance but in Mammoth Cave they are found miles back in the caves. Along the passages in Mammoth Cave and other caves arc many evidences of Indians believed to have belonged to a pre-Columbian tribe who inhabited the region about five hundred years ago. Accumulations of ashes and partially burnt cane and reed torches are scattered along the cave trafls and in some sections of the cave where the walls and ceilings are covered with gypsum there are marks made by Indians as they collected the medicinal salts. Many cultural objects used and abandoned by Indians have been found in the caves. These artifacts include textiles, wooden bowls, woven sandals, gourds, twisted cord, pottery, ladders of pared tree branches and braided strands of grass. These objects show remarkable knowledge of the art of weaving and reveal unusual intelligence, imagination and artistic ability. Tobacco specimens have been found in caves in the park and it has been said that the tobacco leaves and seed pods found in these caves constitute the oldest record of the use of tobacco in the United States. No evidences of Indians have been found below the third level of Mammoth Cave. A number of skeletons have been ' found in the caves in the park, several were discovered around 1813 and one in 1935. These remains were partially mummi­ fied. Preservation of these bodies was brought about by the constant 54 degree temperature of the cave, the low relative humidity of the atmosphere and possibly because of the presence of saltpeter and other salts. These findings have been an important factor in the stimulation of interest in American ethnology. In historic times the Mammoth Cave area together with the whole of Kentucky was not inhabited generally by Indians. Bands of Cherokees, Iroquois and Chickasaws used the region as hunting and fighting grounds, and bitter wars were fought over its ownership.

COMING OF THE WHITE MAN The French were apparently the first white men to come into Kentucky. As game became scarce in the east adven­ turous hunters, trappers and traders pushed westward, finding Kentucky a veritable hunter's paradise. By 1693 Arnold Viele 10 had traveled over some of the region and in 1739 another Frenchman named Longueil discovered Big Bone Lick. On the 13th of April, 1750, Dr. Thomas Walker, employed by the Loyal Land Company to explore lands of its grants, came through Cumberland Gap, marking one of the earliest recorded entrances by Englishmen into Kentucky. Christopher Gist, another Englishman, on March 12, 1751, ferried across the Ohio River and entered Kentucky to explore lands for the Ohio Land Company. When Daniel Boone first gazed on Kentucky through Cumberland Gap in 1769 the trail had already been worn smooth by hunters. Veterans of the French & Indian War with land grants for military services, surveyors, speculators, explorers and hunters swarmed into what Boone described as an 'earthly paradise.' By 1775 the folk movement into Kentucky was in full swing. Perhaps the first white men to come to the Green River section were the picturesque "Long Hunters," so called be­ cause of their long stay in the Kentucky wilderness. These men spent many months in 1770/71 in the Green and Cum­ berland River country amassing great stores of skins and furs. There were few settlers in the Mammoth Cave area before 1800, and the first hardy ones to settle along the Green River bottoms and Valley Sinks were emigrants from Virginia and North Carolina, predominantly of Anglo-Saxon stock. The . names of some of the earliest of them were Slimmons, Shackel­ ford, Coats, Holton, Gray, Sell, Vance, Ester, Cox, Neville, Meredith, Sanders, Roberts, Doyle and Houchins. A few Swedish families settled in the region toward the end of the nineteenth century. The first Negroes in the Mammoth Cave area were slaves belonging to the owners of the caves. The percentage of them was small, but a Negro community, made up of slave guides and their families, was for many years within walking distance of Mammoth Cave. That the majority of the pioneers in the area were part of the great Baptist migration from Virginia into Kentucky is evidenced by the fact that, with the exception of the Locust Grove Methodist, all of the churches within the present park boundary were Baptist churches. As in most rural Kentucky communities in the early days social life centered around the church. Dry Branch, Silent Grove, Chestnut Grove, Joppa, Locust Grove, Good Spring, Temple Hill, Little Hope, Mam­ moth Cave, Little Jordan and Stockholm were the names of some of the early places of worship, some of which served 11 the dual role of church and school, and in many of which services are still held. The names of a few of the early Baptist preachers were Jacob Lock; P. M. Dorsey, who lived on the north side of Green River; Richard Doyel, who lived in what is known as Doyel Valley; Bowling Sanders, who stammered so badly when he first started preaching that he could scarcely talk; and A. P. Cooper. Although there were many Catholics in the northwestern part of Edmonson County, there were no early Catholic churches in the park area. The chief industry of the Mammoth Cave settlers was farming, and while there was some good farm land along the river bottoms, the valley sinks and the tops of the ridges, comparatively little of the land in the knobby, hilly country was fit for agriculture or stock raising, and the majority of these settlers made only a meagre living. They raised some corn and tobacco, and timber was ruthlessly cut and sold to provide ready money. Means of making a living other than farming were scarce. The homes of most of the settlers were small cabins, usually built of logs, and without conveniences. Because of the poor economic conditions existing in the Mammoth Cave area, the social and educational progress of the people has been greatly retarded. The exploitation of Mammoth Cave offered the most prom­ ising means of subsistence and as early as 1812 had begun to be an important economic factor in the lives of the people. They and their descendants were to watch Mammoth Cave grow from a hole in the ground to one of the world's outstand­ ing attractions, and to them goes much of the credit for the de­ velopment of the Cave and the improvements in the park. When Mammoth Cave was made a national park in 1941 over 600 families had been moved off its 51,000 acres. The roots of these families were deep in the history of the cave for a large proportion of them had owed their livelihood for generations to Mammoth Cave and many of the names on Mammoth Cave payrolls today have been on its payrolls for over a hundred years.

PRINCIPAL EVENTS OF THE COLONIAL PERIOD Although fierce disagreement among historians centers about the ownership of the Kentucky territory at the time the whites entered it, much proof exists that, as a result of perhaps 12 WOODLAND TRAIL IN MAMMOTH CAVE NATIONAL PARK

half a century of cruel, devastating war, the land was owned by the Iroquois, or Six Nations Indians. Various treaties were made with the Indians by Colonial land speculators for possession of the western lands, and both France and England claimed the western territory that was later to become Kentucky. This heated rivalry brought on the French & Indian War, a furious frontier struggle which ended in the Treaty of Paris in 1763, in which treaty France ceded to England the territory east of the Mississippi, south of the Ohio and west of the Appalachian mountains. Immediately after the signing of the Treaty of Paris, Virginia's veterans of the French & Indian War began asking 13 that their claims against the state be paid in western bounty grants, and the influx of surveyors and land claimants to Kentucky began. In 17Y2 the Kentucky territory became Fincastle County, Virginia, and in 1776 Kentucky County was created and Virginia transferred her system of local government to the western country. On November 1, 1780 Kentucky County was divided into three local units by the creation of Fayette, Lincoln and Jefferson Counties, Virginia. The Mammoth Cave area was in the Lincoln County boundaries. Subsequent divisions of Kentucky counties placed the Mammoth Cave area next in Logan County in 1792, then in Warren County in 1796, and finally in 1825 in Edmonson County, where the main portion of Mammoth Cave National Park is today. Small portions of the park are in Hart and Barren Counties.

EARLY OWNERS, GUIDES, DISCOVERERS Although tradition says that Mammoth Cave itself was discovered by the hunter Houchins in 1799, the first official record of the property is in the Warren County Survey Book 1796-1815, under date of August 18, 1799, page 210 as follows: "Valentine Simon enters 200 acres of second rate land in Warren County by virtue of the Commissioner's Certificate No. 2428 lying on Green River beginning on a sycamore tree on the bank of said River thence running southward including two petre caves, thence angling down said river for quantity to include the improvement." These two caves were Dixon's Cave and Mammoth Cave as appears from the patent issued January 31, 1812 by Charles Scott, Esq., Governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. It is not known who first became aware of saltpeter mixed with the fine dry cave dirt in Mammoth Cave, but because of this valuable nitrate influential men became interested in the cave. Men, who were later to realize its significance, not only as a source of a critically needed nitrate, but also as one of the world's natural wonders. The embargo which England clamped on the United States immediately upon the outbreak of the War of 1812 made it impossible to obtain needed supplies from foreign sources. Nitrates, necessary in the manufacture of gunpowder, were shut off from American use and nitrous earth from Mammoth 14 Cave was practically the only nitrate available for making the gunpowder needed to carry on the war. The presence of this valuable nitrate caused the value of Mammoth Cave to increase tremendously, and on July 9, 1812 ownership of the cave area changed hands three times and increased in value from $116.67 to $3,000. John Flatt, of Barren County, purchased the Mammoth Cave tract for $116.67 from Valentine Simmons, under deed dated July 9, 1812, and recorded in Warren County Deed Book 6 page 49. On the same day George, Leonard and John McLean paid Flatt $400 for the tract and sold 156 acres of it, including Mammoth Cave, to Fleming Gatewood and Charles Wilkins for $3,000. A little over a month later, on August 25, 1812, Hyman Gratz, a Philadelphia merchant, purchased Fleming Gate- wood's one half interest in this tract, including Mammoth Cave, for $10,000. Gratz and Wilkins brought experience and capital to the saltpeter mining operations in Mammoth Cave. The price of saltpeter was high and under the direction of Archibald Miller, agent of Gratz and Wilkins, great amounts of the salt were extracted by slave labor during the war years and shipped by land in oxcaVts and by boats on the Green and Ohio Rivers to Philadelphia gunpowder factories. The saltpeter found in Mammoth Cave was calcium nitrate, probably derived from the guano of the millions of bats that had inhabited the caves. Since calcium nitrate is what is known as "false saltpeter" it had to be converted into potas­ sium nitrate or "true saltpeter" before it could be used for the making of gunpowder. This operation was carried out in the cave and the hand-hewn wooden pipe lines and bleach­ ing vats, made of tulip or yellow poplar and oak, which were used in this converting process, are remarkably preserved and are still to be seen in their original locations a short distance from the Historic Entrance in Mammoth Cave. Hyman Gratz paid $400.00 for the remaining 40 acres of the original 200 acre tract of land on April 20, 1813. Upon the end of the War of 1812 the demand for saltpeter decreased and soon thereafter Gratz and Wilkins stopped the manufacture of it at Mammoth Cave and, capitalizing on the fame the cave had won during the War, began showing it to visitors. In order to control all possible entrances to the 15 cavern they increased the original 200 acres to about 1,340 acres. From 1812 until 1816 Archibald Miller, and his brothers, William and James, acted ais agents for Gratz and Wilkins, lived on the cave premises and exhibited the cave. Until 1828 the Mammoth Cave property owned by Gratz and Wilkins was administered by agents. The Millers were followed by James Moore, their brother-in-law, and by Charles Gatewood, son of a former owner. During all of this time Mammoth Cave was shown to visitors, but interest in it declined, and on June 28, 1828 Hyman Gratz paid the execu­ tors of the estate of Charles Wflkins only $200 for Wilkins half interest and became the sole owner of the tract. The next ten years were uneventful, except for minor inci­ dental explorations, and in 1837 the property again exchanged hands. It was bought by Franklin Gorin of Glasgow, Ken­ tucky, for $5,000. Although Gorin only owned the cave for two years it was during his ownership that official guides were first used in the cave, extensive explorations and discoveries were made and Mammoth Cave again became famous. In a letter which Mr. Gorin wrote February 9, 1868 to Dr. Forwood, author of "An Historical and Descriptive Narrative of the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky," he said "In 1837 I pur­ chased the cave and property when it was in a delapidated state, and placed Mrs. Moore there (Mr. Moore having pre­ viously died) together with Archibald Miller, her nephew, and son of the previous occupant of the same name, as my agents ... it was while I owned the property that a nephew of mine, Mr. Charles F. Harvey . . . was lost in the cave for thirty-nine hours. After he was found I determined to have further explorations. At that time no person had ever been beyond the Bottomless Pit ... I placed a guide in the cave— the celebrated and great Stephen, and he aided in making the discoveries. He was the first person who ever crossed the Bottomless Pit, and he, myself and another person, whose name I have forgotten, were the only persons ever at the bottom of Gorin's Dome to my knowledge . . . previous to these discoveries all interest centered in what is known as the Old Cave." The Stephen to whom Franklin Gorin referred in his letter of 1868 was Stephen Bishop, a negro slave, who became the most famous of a long line of guides, both white and colored, 16 whose adventures and heroic explorations are colorful threads woven in and out of the annals of Mammoth Cave's history. The important discoveries in Mammoth Cave have been made by its guides from the time Stephen Bishop in 1837 crossed Bottomless Pit on a slender cedar pole and opened up the extensive avenues beyond, to October, 1938, when Carl and Pete Hanson, and Leo and Claude Hunt, deciding to do a bit of 'cavin' as a relief from routine guiding, crawled into a hole above the muddy banks of Roaring River and gazed a few days later, on the beauties of the New Discovery. According to natives of the cave region "cavin' gets in the blood" and the full truth of this homespun observation is borne out by the fact that many of the present cave guides are the sons and grandsons of guides. It has become tradi­ tional for the sons of guides to follow the professions of their fathers and they are proud of their heritage and their cave. Since many of the native families in the area are related by blood or marriage the entire guide group is closely knit and possesses certain unique and admirable qualities. They are courageous, resourceful and equal to any emergency that might arise in the performance of their jobs. The responsi­ bility of guiding millions of visitors through the caves, genera­ tion after generation, has built up in the guides a deep sense of duty, has made them close students of human nature and developed in them keen senses of humor. Stephen Bishop's fame may have been due partly because he was the first guide in the order of time, but was more probably due to the outstanding characteristics and abilities of the man himself. According to Gorin, his master, Stephen was a "self-educated man ... He had a fine genius, a great fund of wit and humor, some little knowledge of Latin and Greek, and much knowledge of geology, but his great talent was his knowledge of man." Mr. Gorin further said regarding him, "There was not any Indian blood in Stephen. I knew his reputed father. I owned Stephen's mother and brother, but not until after both children were born. Stephen was certainly a most extraordinary boy and man. His talents were of the first order. He was trustworthy and reliable; he was companionable; he Was a hero and he could be a clown. He knew a gentleman or a lady as if by instinct. He learned whatever he wished to learn without trouble or labor, and professors of geology spoke highly of his knowledge in that department of science." 17 So popular did Stephen become that he achieved world wide renown. His knowledge of the cave and his intelligence made him invaluable to the many scientists who came about the middle of the nineteenth centry to Mammoth Cave, and who gave names to many of the features of the cave. Naturally Stephen knew of the movement in Kentucky to send free slaves to Liberia, and it was his dream and plan to buy his freedom and take his wife and child there, but he died June 15, 1859, before his dream could be realized. He is buried in the guide's cemetery in the park and above his grave is a modest tombstone, bearing a simple inscription, "Stephen Bishop, First Guide Explorer of the Mammoth Cave, Died June 15, 1859 in his 37 year." Sharing honors with Stephen as a guide were Matt and Nick Bransford, brothers, who were also negro slaves. When Matt Bransford died in 1886 his mantle descended to the shoulders of his son, Henry, then to Henry's sons. Matt & Louis, and finally to his great grandson, Elzie Bransford, so that for over 100 years one or more members of the Bransford family guided visitors through Mammoth Cave. William Garvin, discoverer of the Corkscrew, Ed Hawkins, and Edward Bishop, descendant of Stephen, were all negro guides, to whom Mammoth Cave is indebted for much of its fame. Some of the early white guides credited with important discoveries in the early days were Charles and Abraham Meredith, Frank Demunbrun, Samuel Meredith, James Hunt and John and Tom Lee. The exact dates of the important discoveries in Mammoth Cave are difficult to establish. The search for new supplies of 'peterdirt' during the War of 1812 led to the discovery of many of the seemingly unending corridors in Mammoth Cave, but comparatively few important discoveries were made until after Stephen Bishop crossed Bottomless Pit in 1837. The bridge which opened up the extensive avenues beyond Bot­ tomless Pit made possible the discovery of River Hall, Echo River and Roaring River. Stephen accompanied John Craig of Philadelphia and Brice Patton, a teacher in the Blind Asylum in Louisville, when they discovered Cleveland's Cabi­ net sometime before 1859. In 1859 Courtland Prentice, adventurous son of George D. Prentice, editor of the Louisville Courier-Journal, achieved what was considered the maximum in cave adventure, when 18 GROUP OF EARLY MAMMOTH CAVE GUIDES — ED BISHOP; JOSH WILSON; WILL BRANSFORD DR. WILLIS RENSHAW, HOTEL LESSEE; HENRY GOSSOM, HOTEL CLERK; LOUIS CHARLET, HOTEL MANAGER; JOHN M. NELSON; MATT BRANSFORD AND BOB LIVELY.

he descended into the Maelstrom, a deep, yawning pit nine miles from the cave entrance. Prentice's descent into the Maelstrom was eulogized many times in poetry and prose. According to tradition a man named Babbitt was said to have been lowered successfully into the Maelstrom by Nick Bransford and William Garvin, and in 1863, four years after Prentice, an Englishman by the name of F. J. Stephenson, with the aid of Frank Demunbrun and Matt Bransford, made the perilous descent. The management at Mammoth Cave denied all requests for permission to descend the Maelstrom from 1863 until 1905 when an exception was made to Benjamin F. Einbigler of New York. Einbigler and John Nelson, guide, descended into 19 the pit that year and inscribed their names and the date. May 15, 1905, on a square flat stone at the bottom. F. J. Stephenson also claimed to be the first white man who explored Roaring River, which he reached by a passage open­ ing at the Cascade beyond Echo River. William Garvin, in 1870, discovered the Corkscrew after deductions which he made by observing the movements of bats in the cave. In 1882 Martha Washington's Statue was accidentally dis­ covered by two parties of visitors who met at that point. Max Kaemper and Edward Bishop, guide, found their way through Ultima Thule in 1908 to discover Violet City. About 1915 George D. Morrison, a prospector for oil in Edmonson County, Kentucky, became convinced that the avenues of Mammoth Cave ran far beyond the surface boundaries of the Mammoth Cave estate. According to John B. Rodes, in his "A Short Legal History of Mammoth Cave" in the 1929 Proceedings of the Kentucky State Bar Association, Mr. Morrison "began to take options on a large extent of territory surrounding the Mammoth Cave estate and to obtain a survey of its subterranean passages. He is said to have sent persons into the cave to listen for the sound of the drilling machine where he was operating. He was charged also with sending others into the cave to fire heavy charges of dynamite in the hope of lifting the surface of the ground and thereby indicating its location. He actually secured an entry by this method and was discovered with a party of men in Mammoth Cave and arrested and fined for trespass. In the year 1916 he found an entrance upon the land of Perry Cox and actually again found his way into Mammoth Cave. But here the Colossal Cavern Company, which owns the cave rights in the Perry Cox land, intervened and enjoined him. In the year 1921 he formed the Mammoth Cave Development Com­ pany and renewed his efforts to find a surface entrance through those subterranean caverns which he was convinced could be found underneath the great Mammoth Cave region and yet outside of the boundaries of the Mammoth Cave estate. This he eventually succeeded in and the same is now called the New Entrance to Mammoth Cave." "For a time the rival claims as to which really was the better and more wonderful part of Mammoth Cave were very loud and conflicting. Finally the trustees of the Mammoth Cave estate sought to enjoin the Mammoth Cave Development 20 Company in the District Court of the United States for the western district of Kenucky from the use of the name. Mammoth Cave, or New Entrance to Mammoth Cave, upon the ground that that name had a special and secondary mean­ ing applicable only to caverns underneath the boundaries of the Mammoth Cave estate. The proof disclosed the remarkable fact that underneath the Mammoth Cave ridge is a great labyrinth of subterranean passages all connecting. Indeed the Colossal Cavern Company had known for a long number of years that the caverns underneath some of its lands con­ nected with the caverns underneath the lands of the Mammoth Cave estate. The court held on September 4, 1926, that the word "Mammoth Cave" was fairly applicable to all this general system or labyrinth of caverns and possessed no special or secondary meaning which could be appropriated by the trustees of the Mammoth Cave estate. But both the District Court and the Circuit Court of Appeals held that the defendants had been guilty of unfair practices and that for the protection of the public the defendants were compelled to advertise with all of their literature, using the phrase, "We do not show any part of the cave which prior to 1907 was generally known to the public as Mammoth Cave; that portion of the cave can be seen only through the old entrance." The Mammoth Cave Development Company, in 1923, built a 25 room hotel at the New Entrance, which became the Frozen Niagara Hotel. The first manager of the hotel was William M. O'Neal, a veteran hotel man, who was succeeded in 1929 by Lemuel Ferguson. Ferguson operated the hotel until 1931 when the Kentucky National Park Commission purchased the New Entrance, then known as Frozen Niagara. The Commission made Lemuel Ferguson manager of both the hotel and the cave at the New Entrance. When the Mammoth Cave Operating Committee was formed in 1934 Lemuel Ferguson was made manager of both the Mammoth Cave Hotel and the New Entrance Hotel, and Martin L. Charlet was made manager of both entrances. The hotels and both entrances to the cave were operated in this manner until 1936 when H. S. Sanborn took over the management of both hotels. The New Entrance Hotel was not operated after the National Park Service assumed full mangaement of the park in 1941, and the hotel was demolished in 1945. The New Entrance Hotel was known as the Frozen Niagara Hotel after Mr. Sanborn became manager. 21 The discovery of the Frozen Niagara section was in 1923 when an opening was made through an immense pile of rocks in one of the five avenues leading from Grand Central Station. It is one of Mammoth Cave's outstanding exhibits. There was much speculation after the discovery of the New Entrance to Mammoth Cave that other openings might be found leading into Mammoth Cave. This speculation led to an attempt at discovery that was to focus the eyes of the nation on Mammoth Cave and bring it to the front page of every newspaper in the United States. A sand hole about seven miles from Mammoth Cave but on the same ridge section as the entrance to the cave was the subject of much local talk. A 35 year old local cave explorer and guide named Floyd Collins, who in 1917 discovered Crystal Cave on his father's

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FROZEN NIAGARA 22 farm, became interested in this sand hole and made an agree­ ment with the owners of the farm on which it was located, under which agreement he was to receive a half interest in the hole should he be successful in opening it up. At 6:30 on the morning of Friday, January 30, 1925, Floyd Collins set out to explore the sand hole and four hours later a falling boulder caught his foot, trapping him in a narrow crevice that formed a natural straight-jacket for his body. He was found the next morning and for eighteen days his father, Lee Collins; his brother. Homer Collins; William Burke "Skeets" Miller, a 21 year old reporter for the Louisville Courier-Journal, who made numerous dangerous trips down the narrow, tortuous passage to Collins' side; Everett Maddox, and other volunteer rescuers fought heroically with the aid of geologists and engineers to free him. Meanwhile thousands of sightseers piled into nearby Cave City and state troops kept order at bayonet point as mass emotion gripped the country over the plight of the doomed man. Newspaper correspondents wired hourly bulletins to newspapers over the nation. All efforts to rescue Floyd Collins alive proved futile and on February 16,1925, he was declared dead. Funeral services were held over the caved in sand hole, but later Collins' body was removed and placed in a casket in Crystal Cave. On October 10, 1938 four excited cave guides, Carl Hanson; his son, Pete Hanson, and Leo and Claude Hunt, reported that they had just gone through "Purgatory to Paradise," and dis­ covered what is now known as the New Discovery. Their find developed from an expedition up Roaring River to catch eyeless fish for display, and is not yet open to the public. Henry W. Lix, Park Naturalist, in The Living Wilderness for December, 1946, says that "All those who have seen the New Discovery agree that it is different from anything in the old part of Mammoth Cave. They agree that it has more unusual features, more abundant and spectacular cave formations. Impressive, too, is the whiteness, the cleanliness, of the pas­ sageways. It is like a beautiful masterpiece unsoiled and bright—like a sparkling gift just unwrapped." Over four miles of passageway in the New Discovery have been surveyed, but many miles are still uncharted. A new entrance has been blasted, along the slope of a valley, to make it more accessible. A study of the animal life in the New Discovery was made by Kenneth Dearolf, biologist while it was still new. 23 And so, explorations in the underground wilderness of Mammoth Cave go on, "cavin' " is in the blood of Mammoth Cave guides and the allure of what is just around the corner is a constant challenge. It has been said that the human appeal of the Cave is ever present since it has become a "century old repository of slowly accumulating historic and biographic facts, of wit and humor and imaginative interpretation, handed down in the form of place, names and more or less apt remarks flowing from the lips of jovial guides." Inevitably, the names of the rivers, formations and avenues of Mammoth Cave have come from personages, time, tradition, events, gods and goddesses of mythology, pure whimsy and similarity to everyday things, i.e. the Corkscrew, Scylla and Charybdis, Side Saddle Pit, Bacon Chamber, The River Styx, Wooden Bowl Room, Martha Washington's Statue, September Morn, Gorin's Dome, Audu­ bon Avenue, Jenny Lind's Armchair, Ruins of Karnak, Violet City and Ultima Thule. In the early 1830's the fame of Mammoth Cave reached Europe and the ears of Dr. John Croghan, a young Louisville physician, the son of Major William Croghan and Lucy Clark, a sister of George Rogers Clark. Embarrassed by his lack of knowledge about this wonder in his home state Dr. Croghan visited it immediately upon his return to America, and on October 8, 1839 he purchased the property, which had now increased to 1610 acres, from Franklin Gorin, for the sum of $10,000. For the next ten years Dr. Croghan spent large amounts of money in the development of Mammoth Cave, improving its grounds, roads and buildings. The purity'of the air in Mammoth Cave and the evenness of the temperature inspired Dr. Croghan in 1843 to attempt to establish the cave as a sanatorium and health resort. Horace C. Hovey in his Guide Book to the Mammoth Cave relates a visit he made to the scene of the experiment in 1890, "The roofless remains of two stone cottages are next visited, as having a melancholy interest on account of their history. These and ten frame ones, now torn down, were built in 1843 for the use of fifteen consumptive patients, who here took up their abode, induced to do so by the uniformity of the temperature, and the highly oxygenated air of the cave, which has the purity without the rarity of the air at high altitudes. The second stone house was a dining room, all the rest were lodging rooms, and were well furnished. The cottages were not all at this spot, one was about 100 yards within Audubon's 24 Avenue; in which a Mr. Mitchell, from South Carolina, lived for five months, and then died. He was buried in a little cemetery near the cave and his body was afterwards taken away. The next cottage was near Wandering Willie's Spring. Still another was erected in Pensicola Avenue. All the others, nine in number, stood in a line, about 30 feet apart, extend­ ing from the Acute Angle onward. The experiment was an utter failure; as was also the pitiful attempt on the part of these poor invalids to make trees and shrubbery grow around their dismal huts." One other patient besides Mr. Mitchell died and the balance came out of the cave much worse. Two of the stone cottages are still standing in the main avenue of Mammoth Cave. Dr. Croghan died a bachelor, leaving a will dated January 10, 1849, which was probated February 5, 1849 in Jefferson County, Kentucky, by the terms of which he devised all the cave properties to trustees to be held for nine nephews and nieces until the death of the last one. The will is recorded in Jefferson County Will Book, 4 pages 121-124. The last of the heirs died in California on August 27, 1926. For over three quarters of a century the Mammoth Cave estate was con­ trolled and operated by these trustees.

EARLY VISITORS The path which the world has beaten to Mammoth Cave's door ever since the War of 1812 has been trod not only by the casual tourist but by archaeologists, scientists and his­ torians who were inspired to write of its wonders; by royalty awed by its grandeur; and by actors, musicians and singers who were moved to act, play and sing in its vast corridors. . The rich archaelogical and scientific material in Mammoth Cave drew scientists, archaeologists and writers as early as 1814 when the first description of Mammoth Cave as a natural wonder was published. One of Mammoth Cave's historians. Dr. Horace Carter Hovey, spent much time between 1880 and 1912 studying the cave and cave region. Mushrooms which Dr. Hovey found on the banks of Echo River reminded him of the great mushroom farms developed in French caves and he induced the cave owners in the early 1880's to try to develop a mush­ room industry. This industry became known as the Mam­ moth Cave Mushroom Company, but because of the difficulty in getting water to the beds and the lack of good markets 25 the venture on which many thousands of dollars were spent, proved unsuccessful. Two royal visitors to Mammoth Cave were Dom Pedro, Emperor of Brazil and Grand Duke Alexis of Russia, who dined in the banquet hall February 1, 1872. In 1912 Professor E. A. Martel of Paris, known then as the greatest cave authority in the world visited Mammoth Cave and Salts Cave. Edwin Booth in 1876 recited Hamlet's "Soliloquy" in what is now known as Booth's Amphitheatre; the great Norwegian violinist, Ole Bull, played his violin on two occasions in one of the cave's great halls, which now bears his name; and the golden voice of Jenny Lind echoed through Mammoth Cave's corridors on her visit to the cave on April 5, 1851. The irregularly shaped travertine column on which Jenny Lind sat to sing, "The Last Rose of Summer" has since that day been shown to thousands of people as "Jenny Lind's Armchair." Helen Gould, Madam Schumann-Heink and William Jen­ nings Bryan are among the long list of notables and famous visitors to Mammoth Cave which included other prominent people from all parts of the world, many of whom have writ­ ten vivid descriptions of their visits. Among them was Billy Sunday, who said, after a brief trip in the cave, "I felt smaller today than I ever did in my Iffe for I've just returned from exploring caverns that God has scooped out underneath the green hills of Kentucky. There is only one word in the language to describe Mammoth Cave, and that is "Mammoth."

STAGECOACH DAYS Tourists who came to Mam­ moth Cave in the early years came in stagecoaches which, by 1816, were running on regular routes and schedules through Kentucky. Main stagecoach lines ran from Lexington and other large towns and connected with numerous smaller lines which, for the most part, were purely local, as were the ones which ran from Glasgow Junc­ tion (now Park City) and Cave City, to Mammoth Cave.

26 Stages, carrying mail and passengers, commenced running on the road between Louisville and Nashville in 1836. About 1850, after the coming of the railroads to Kentucky, many travelers to Mammoth Cave came by rail to Cave City and from there by stagecoach to the cave. By 1860 travel to Mammoth Cave had increased so much that one of the larger stagecoach lines, Irvine, Hawkins & Co. of Lexington, advertised in the Lextington, Kentucky Statesman, of April 9, 1860, that their stagecoach "leaving Lexington daily . . . passed within a short distance of Mammoth Cave and is the best route for that point." The contact point with the local stagecoach line at that time was Cave City. The winding ten mile road from Cave City to Mammoth Cave during stagecoach days was graphically described by Dr. W. Stump Forwood in An Historical and Descriptive Nar­ rative of Kentucky, published in 1870: "At the date of our journey the latter part of May this road was in a comparatively good condition, but in the winter and early part of the spring it is said to be almost impassable to travelers. The greater part of the soil is a light colored, sticky clay, with a little sand at intervals . . . there are small cultivated patches of ground here and there, scarcely deserving the name of farms. The country generally is covered with straggling forests, consist­ ing chiefly of "blackjack" white oak, chestnut, etc. Frequently along the road may be seen small circular depressions in the ground called "sinks," the surface having fallen in in con­ sequence of subterraneous excavation. The whole of the surrounding country appears to be of a cavernous nature; and if the traveler should be so unfortunate as to possess a timid disposition or large development of caution, he might be apprehensive of a sudden disappearance of the stagecoach into the bowels of the earth." The earliest stagecoach line to Mammoth Cave was from Glasgow Junction with headquarters at Bell's Tavern and the last one of the stagecoach drivers from this point was Jim Hayden. The fare from Glasgow Junction was $1.00 a pas­ senger and the stagecoach stopped at Proctor's and Diamond Caves. A man by the name of Andy McCoy operated the stage line from Cave City. He ran two coaches on regular sched­ ules on this route, bearing the impressive names of the "Florida" and the "John E. Bell." Drawn by four or six horses or mules, the stagecoaches were handsome Concord body vehicles driven with great pride and flourish. The ap- 27 ..«**^r .j^

STAGECOACHES AT THE OLD MAMMOTH CAVE HOTEL

proach of the stagecoach to the Hotel at Mammoth Cave was announced by the sounding of a bugle, and upon arrival it was met by negro servants to carry luggage and a throng of people expecting guests. About 1816 the stagecoach began to replace the post rider carrying mail and until 1852 held the mail carrying contract in the State. In addition to mail there was often aboard the Cave City-Mammoth Cave coach a clerk carrying large sums of money from the hotel for deposit in the bank. There are many tales old timers tell of the stagecoach days but for pure adventure the story of the Jesse James robbery tops them all. A wave of lawlessness swept through Kentucky between 1870 and 1880 making it dangerous for stagecoaches to operate, since bandits had become so bold that it was not unusual for them to attack unmasked and in broad daylight. Jesse James, the notorious outlaw, attracted by the success of his partners in crime, came to Kentucky and made his headquarters at or near Lebanon. On the afternoon of Friday, September 3, 1880, the stage­ coach "John A. Bell" drawn by six horses and operated by Andy McCoy, left Mammoth Cave for Cave City with seven passengers aboard: Judge R. H. Rountree, his daughter. Miss 28 Lizzie Rountree, a relative, Phil Rountree of Lebanon, J. E. Craig, Jr. of Lawrenceburg, Ga., S. W. Shelton of Calhoun, Tenn., S. H. Frolechstein of Mobile, Ala., George M. Paisley and W. G. Welsh of Pittsburg, Pennsylvania. Just about dusk, as the stagecoach rounded a curve near where the Little Hope Church now stands, two mounted, unmasked men rode out of the forest, held up the stage and ordered all of the terrified passengers out in the road. A conflicting story is that because of his advanced age Judge Rountree was allowed to remain in the coach, and that out of gallantry Miss Rountree was not ordered out. With great presence of mind Phil Rountree slipped his wallet and watch under the seat before he left the coach. One of the bandits kept the passengers covered with a gun while the other talking pleasantly as he worked, took a handsome gold watch and $55 from Judge Rountree; $670 from Mr. Craig; $50 from Mr. Shelton; $23 from Mr. Frolechstein; $33 from Mr. Paisley; a gold watch from Mr. Welch and several diamond rings from Miss Rountree. With a final show of gallantry the bandit, apologizing for his rudeness, told them that "business de­ manded it," wished them "better luck next time," and rode off with his companion into the woods. It happened that the money from the Mammoth Cave Hotel had been taken into the bank earlier in the afternoon by a rider on horseback. The stagecoach lost no time in getting into Cave City. Descriptions of the two men were published immediately by Judge Rountree and Governor Blackburn, and rewards offered for their capture. Several weeks later a man named T. J. Hunt was arrested in Ohio County and placed in the Glasgow Jail where he stayed for 18 months awaiting trial. At his trial he denied any participation in the robbery, but he was convicted and sentenced to serve three years in the peni­ tentiary. While Hunt was awaiting trial Jesse James was murdered in St. Joseph, Missouri, by one of his accomplices, and on his body was found Judge Rountree's watch and Miss Rountree's diamond rings. Sometime later it was proven that a man named Bill Ryan was with Jesse James when the stagecoach was robbed, and after spending nearly two years in jail for a crime he did not commit. Hunt was pardoned. Rivahy between the stagecoach and the railroad became keen during the 1860's and as the 'iron horse' encroached 29 more and more upon its living counterpart the stagecoach was finally in the late 1880's driven off the turnpikes.

EARLY INNS, HOTELS AND THEIR KEEPERS The day of the stagecoach was also the era of inns and taverns where travelers stopped to rest or spend the night. As civic centers these inns played an important part in the political and social life of the people. Here people met to exchange gossip and listen as the traveler imparted outside news. Here shows and exhibitions were given, lotteries were held, concerts and dances took place and famous guests were entertained. Kentucky inns and taverns became famous for their lavish hospitality. Rambles in the Mammoth Cave During the Year 1844," published in 1845, shows thirty-six stagecoach stops and distances between stops from Louisville, Nashville, Bardstown, Lexington and Glasgow to Mammoth Cave. There were inns or taverns at most of these stops, several of which became well known, among them were the Stone Inn, later Talbott's Tavern at Bardstown, which is still one of Kentucky's most famous eating places; Dripping Springs; Kerr's Inn at Munfordsville; Eagle House in Elizabethtown and Dickey's Tavern at Prewitt's Knob. The most famous of the Inns in the Mammoth Cave area was Bell's Tavern at what was known first as Three Forks, then Glasgow Junction and is now Park City. This famous old tavern, constructed by slave labor, was considered the half-w.iy house between Louisville and Nashville. The proprietor was William Bell, referred to as the "Napoleon of Tavern Keepers." Franklin Gorin in The Times of Long Ago, reprinted from a series of papers printed in The Glasgow Times, in 1876, said, "Bell's Tavern was a great attraction, it had no superior, and was universally known in America and Europe. It was near the Mammoth Cave, and during Mr. Bell's life was the stopping place for all visitors going to or returning from the cave. Mr. Bell was a perfect gentleman in manners and address, yea, in every respect. He was gifted with a perfect talent of knowing and anticipating person's wants at a glance. He knew, although he may not have ever seen his guest before, whether he wanted or not a glass of his peach and honey; and he knew exactly what other refreshments he desired, whether venison or beef steak, quail or ham and eggs. His object was to please and satisfy all. His peach brandy and honey was almost as well known as his 30 house, for he had no equal in the preparation of it, and his famous flapjacks." Henry Clay, Thomas Marshall, the Humphreys and Judge Rowan, who were leading politicians of the day held political sessions at Bell's Tavern and Jenny Lind and her party were among the prominent guests who spent the night there. Like most public places of the times Bell's Tavern had its local celebrities, the two outstanding being Uncle Jim, the colored centenarian who was distinguished because he had received a quarter from George Washington on one occasion, and on another had held Thomas Jefferson's horse, and Shad, the "blackest little girl with the whitest teeth" in the world. Bell's Tavern burned in the early 1860's and a stone struc­ ture, patterned after the old Gibson House in Cincinnati, was half completed at the beginning of the War between the States. It was never finished. Nathaniel Willis, in a letter describing his visit to Mammoth Cave in 1852 remarked he "noticed throughout Kentucky and all the West that in all small villages the landlord (of a tavern) is a person who is considered to honor the guest by his company. There is nothing doubtful in his position. That and the profession of stage-driving are too rich in opportunity for influence, give too much access to the minds and opinions of the community, not to have been gradually promoted to the class of occupations for the 'leading citizens'. A judge drove the stage in which I crossed the country from Harrods- burg . . . the wealthy nabob of Elizabethtown was the 'stage agent' who helped us into the changed coach and arranged our baggage." Tavern rates were set by the County Courts, and rates fixed by the Barren County Court in December, 1818, are typical of the Mammoth Cave area: "Rum, wine or French brandy, per quart, $1.50; whisky or peach brandy, per half pints, 12%c; cider oil, per quart, 25c; cider or beer, per quart, 12%c; diet, per meal, 25c; lodging per night, 12y2C; stabling, with provender, per night, 50c; corn or oats per gallon, 12%c; pasturage for horse, per night, 6%c; pasture for each head of cattle, per night, 2c." The old Mammoth Cave Hotel was, according to an early writer, "hand hewed from the timbers of the forest in the early days of the nation's history, it enlisted the strong arms of the pioneers who were Thomas Lincoln's contemporaries, and the method of its construction was that of the Lincoln cabin." 31 Built on the site of the log cabins used by the saltpeter miners in the War of 1812, some of the cabins formed the nucleus of the building and as visitation increased additional cabins were added in a long row. Finally these cabins were connected and weatherboarded. At a still later date, a spacious frame building was added to the front, complete with offices, parlors and a ball room, giving the whole struc­ ture the shape of a letter "L." Around the building were wide verandahs and six hundred feet of covered portico. A three story kitchen was added about 1875. The ball room at Mammoth Cave was one of its most famous features from about 1865 until well beyond the Gay Nineties period. Guests sat and talked in the evenings around the great log fires, or danced to the music of orchestras that gave them the signal for retiring with "Home, Sweet Home" and awakened them in the mornings with the lively strains of "Dixie." Hospitality was lavish and tables were bountfful. One guest in 1870 wrote "The visitor is surprised to find in this uncultivated backwoods such a large and cheerful looking dwelling and so handsome a lawn . . . here are to be found all the advantages of a first class watering place hotel with the addition of fine country scenery and daily opportunities of observing Nature's great subterranean wonder." The Mammoth Cave Hotel caught fire on the night of December 9, 1916, and according to one writer, the spacious frame building, part of which had stood for over a century, was burned to the ground in less than an hour's time. Several of the small log buildings adjacent to the hotel did not burn and from 1916 to 1919 they were used for guest accommodations. In 1919 a twenty-two room buflding was erected for sleeping quarters for guests. In 1925 the major portion of the present Mammoth Cave Hotel was constructed and in 1930 an addition was made to the main structure. The 43 room Mammoth Cave Hotel soon became inadequate to accommodate guests to the Park and ten cottages were built adjacent to the hotel in 1937. In addition thirty-nine cabins and six huts have been constructed.

MAMMOTH CAVE RAILROAD The popularity which Mammoth Cave enjoyed from about 1837 reached a high peak after the end of the Civil War and marked a trend of travel which was to continue until close to the turn of the century. Forty or fifty thousand visitors came annually to see the caves and were transported by 32 stagecoach from Cave City or Glasgow Junction to Mammoth Cave, until 1886, by which time a great network of railroads had spread throughout Kentucky. This new, rapid, more comfortable means of transportation signed the death warrant of the stagecoach, and one by one, these old lines were dis­ continued. In 1886 Col. R. H. Lacey of Franklin, Kentucky; Col. Over­ ton Lea, Jere Baxter, L. J. Proctor, the owner of a cave and a hotel, J. Hill Eakin and Col. Whiteford R. Cole, considering it feasible to build a railroad between Mammoth Cave and Glasgow Junction, a distance of 8.7 miles, founded the Mam­ moth Cave Railroad Company. The result of the efforts of these foresighted men was the construction of a railroad which was to function for fifty years between the two points, and which, with the exception of the last few years of its existence, and a bad period during the nineties, always returned a fair profit. Jim McDaniel and Henry Chapman commenced actual construction of the railroad July 3, 1886, and the first train carrying passengers was operated over the road sometime in November of the same year. In an old Mammoth Cave estate ledger and Hotel Register under the date of Monday, November 8, 1886 there appears the name of the first pas­ senger to ride on the Mammoth Cave Raflroad—"November 8 —Monday, W. F. Richardson, USA, 1st Passenger on Mammoth Cave Railroad (Ticket No. 1350) $3.00." By contract dated September 15, 1886 the Louisville & Nashville Railroad leased the Mammoth Cave Railroad for a period of twenty-five years. The fare was $2.00 a round trip for a journey which gave the passengers a twenty-five minute ride each way through rugged country, across trestles and around curves placed at strategic places by engineers with eyes only toward avoiding expensive alterations in the landscape. Stops between Bell's Tavern and Mammoth Cave were at Diamond Caverns, Chau- mont Post Office, Union City, Proctor's Hotel and Sloan's Crossing. At least one round trip daily was made in the winter but the number of daily trips in the summer varied according to the volume of travel. The equipment of the railroad consisted of two locomotives of the dummy type, two combination coaches and two pas­ senger coaches. The coaches were made of wood and were heated with coal stoves. Service on the railroad, like guide services in the cave, tended towards becoming an institution. Engineer Pat Moran, fireman, Pete Charlet, and conductor and general manager of the road, J. P. Whitney, had long years of service to their credit. Their duties were not confined to merely hauling human cargo, but they were responsible for whatever freight business the road enjoyed. Farm implements, farm produce and food supplies for the hotel were carried along with the passengers and shopping in Glasgow Junction was done for the country folk along the line. There were many jokes and stories told about this Kentucky Toonerville Trolley, not only by local commuters, but foreign visitors as well. Elbert Hubbard, after a visit to Mammoth Cave in 1907 wrote, in his exaggerated humorous style that, "To reach the Mammoth Cave you take the Louisville and Nashville Railroad to Glasgow Junction. There you change cars and take the Mammoth Cave Railroad, an institution that has an equipment of one passenger coach and a dummy engine. I was interested in seeing a Kaffir cutting the grass between the two streaks of rust, and was told that this had to be done three times a year, and is the thing that keeps down the dividends . . . When the merry conductor wanted 34 the train to stop or go ahead he went to the front door and yelled to the engineer." Mr. Hubbard further said that the conductor told him, "You notice that we have our cowcatcher on the rear end, so as to keep the cows out of the ladies' coach. Why, a bull got after us last week and would have ketched us, too, if we hadn't been on the dowa grade!" From "Trails End" the story of the Mammoth Cave Railroad in the Louisville and Nashville Employee's Magazine, May, 1937, we find that on "October 2, 1902, a dividend of 6% on the capital stock (of the Mammoth Cave Railroad) was declared and one new coach purchased ... In 1910 the directors floated a $30,000 bond issue, secured by a mortgage upon their property, to liquidate the floating debt of the rail­ road . . . This issue consisted of 30 bonds of $1,000 each, bearing interest at the rate of 5% per annum and running for 25 years from January 11, 1911, interest payable semi­ annually. The debt actually amounted to only $8,216 but it was thought wise to allow some leeway for emergencies and unforeseen expense ... In the early part of 1912 it was voted to apply $4,000 from the sale of the bonds to pay for over-hauling and reconstructing the track and equipment in anticipation of the annual meeting of the Women's Clubs which was to be held at Mammoth Cave that year. This organization had as one of its chief aims the creation of a Mammoth Cave National Park. A goodly part of the line's right of way lay within the proposed cave area and the man­ agement thought that such a park would greatly increase their road's business . . . On January 7 of the following year further improvement of the road was decided upon and it was voted that the track be placed in such condition as to enable the L & N to run its sleeping cars and other equipment over the Mammoth Cave Railroad to the cave. Routine business, the replacement of equipment, track and personnel, largely occupied the attention of the officers and stockholders at their annual meetings in the years before and after the World War . . . (January 4, 1926) the stockholders attention was called to the condition of the company's branch line to Grand Avenue cave. This cave in the southeastern part of Edmonson County, was served by a mile long branch of the Mammoth Cave Railroad, which had been built some time prior to 1892, but which had not been used for a great many years ... A county road was being constructed and in order that the company might retain its title to its right of way over this road it would be necessary for it to replace the rails and sufficient cross-ties 35 to hold them in place. This work was authorized and J. B. Whitney instructed to proceed with the work. This incident is mentioned here because at one time Grand Avenue Cave gave indication of rivaling Mammoth as an underground at­ traction . . . The little line had by now entered its lean years and for several years prior to February 1, 1928, it operated at a loss. On that date the road was sold to F. L. Gallup of Ypsilanti, who had some plan of building a branch line to connect with the asphalt mines on Green River. This, however, never materialized, and Mr. Gallup sold the road in April, 1921, to a group of stockholders representing the Mammoth Cave National Park Association. Max B. Nahm, of Bowling Green, Ky. was elected president of the new organization." The decline of the roalroad about this time was probably due to the advent of automobiles, busses and hard roads. An editorial in The L ir N Employee's Magazine, September, 1926, made a prophetic statement: "Our information is that automobile travel to Yellowstone National Park this year was three or four times as great as that by railroad. The logical conclusion seems to be that since Mammoth Cave is much nearer the center of population, the relative number of motor tourists to the cave should be many times greater than those who go by rail." Five years later, according to "Trail's End," "the new stock­ holders in a meeting on June 8, 1931, at Franklin, Ky. . . . voted to discontinue its operation, September 1, 1931, and notice was accordingly given the L & N Railroad, the U. S. Postal Department and the other interested parties. At this meeting a committee composed of G. E. Zubrod, real estate agent, L & N Railroad, Louisville, Ky.; Max B. Nahm and R. M. Coleman, Jr. both of Bowling Green; with Mr. Zubrod as chairman, was selected and authorized and empowered to sell and dispose of such busses (the line had experimented with these on rails in its declining years and for a brief period in 1910) cars, engines, coaches, tracks and other equipment of said road at the best price available and to also convey the right of way and property of the Company in whole or in part to the Mammoth Cave National Park Association, or/and to any party, company or agency to which the Com­ mittee may agree to convey to." An L & N extra gang under foreman Ernest Weber, was loaned to the Association for the purpose of removing the rails and ties, and according to local tradition the rails were sold to Italy and used in the Ethiopian campaign. 36 When an Indianapolis judge drove the first automobile to Mammoth Cave on October 7, 1904 the directors of the Mammoth Cave Railroad little dreamed that the great numbers of its successors would by 1931 be one of the biggest contributing factors to the railroad's demise. .** •err-' -o- •-"f^t'/^je-r.rs

COLOSSAL CAVERN AND THE BLUE GRASS COUNTRY CLUB Inasmuch as the success of the Mammoth Cave Railroad depended upon visitation to Mammoth Cave, the L & N Railroad Co. had an understandable interest in the develop­ ment of the area. This interest led officials of the L & N, about 1895 and 1896, to purchase lands in the vicinity. On part of this land, for­ merly owned by Jacob Lock, an early Baptist preacher, was a very beautiful cave known as Colossal Cavern, which was developed and shown to the public, by the Colossal Cavern Company, from about 1900 until the early 1920's. The discovery of Colossal Cavern is claimed by several persons. William Garvin, a veteran Negro guide of Mammoth Cave, claimed that on July 15, 1895 he discovered the opening on a hillside adjoining his farm. A young man named Pike Chapman, who later lost his life in Salts Cave, claimed to have discovered it in 1896 and Robert Woodson, a Negro man, claims to have found the opening while searching for a spring near his home. However, according to Lute Lee of Cave City, Kentucky, the cavern was discovered about 1890 by his brother, Henry Lee, on land belonging to Robert Woodson. Lute and Henry Lee made explorations in the cave and later sold their interest in the discovery of the cave to L. W. Hazen for $150.00. Lute and Henry Lee were hired to help in the development of the cave. Hazen acquired a one-third interest in the cave itself, which interest he sold a short time later to the L & N. 37 Hazen was employed by the L & N as manager of Colossal Cavern. As agent of the L & N Hazen bought the remainder of the cave and several tracts of land in the vicinity of the cavern. On one of these tracts was a cave knowoi as Bed Quilt Cave, in which the Lee brothers, under an agreement with Daniel Breck, L & N representative, found a connection with Colossal Cavern. There were many law suits over the ownership of Colossal Cavern lands and Colossal Cavern affairs, but the Colossal Cavern Company became the sole owners. In the meanwhile Hazen was discharged as manager and James M. Hunt was employed in his place. After the death of James M. Hunt, Charlie Hunt, his nephew, became the manager. The first advertising of Colossal Cavern as a show place was in 1897 under the name of Colossal Cavern Company. Dr. Horace C. Hovey visited the cave in 1903 and made a map of it from notes of a survey by Edgar Vaughan and W. L. Marshall, which was extensively used in the railroad's adver­ tising brochures. The entrance to Colossal Cavern was one and a half miles from the entrance to Mammoth Cave and at the foot of a steep hill facing west. Trips through the Cavern consumed about five hours and visitors were transported by vehicles of various sorts from the Mammoth Cave Hotel. Colossal Cavern enjoyed some measure of success for a few years due to extensive advertising by the L & N but in the 1920's the cave was closed. George Cline, the last guide and caretaker, moved away in 1930. During the 1920*s a small log hotel and several log cabins were built on L & N property near Salts Cave. These buildings became known as the Blue Grass Country Club, where promi­ nent railroad men from all sections of the country came for relaxation, to play golf and to ride horseback. After a few years the club was abandoned and the buildings became a part of CCC Camp No. 1 barracks. In accordance with a promise made the Mammoth Cave National Park Association to donate cave lands owned by the L & N when Mammoth Cave achieved national park status, the Colossal Cavern Company, by deed dated January 23, 1935, conveyed to the United States of America, in fee simple, seven boundaries of land in the cave area, containing 1142.10 acres, and eight boundaries conveying cave and cavern rights, containing 2339.96 acres. This deed is recorded in Deed Book 38 40, page 520, Edmonson County Court Clerk's office, and in Deed Book 41, page 399, Hart County Court Clerk's office. This deed contained a reversionary clause in favor of the L & N Railroad Company, but in a subsequent deed, dated April 25, 1940, Colossal Cavern Company and the L & N Railroad released all rights, title and interest in and to the lands conveyed by the deed of January 23, 1935. By the same deed of April 25, 1940, Colossal Cavern Company conveyed to the United States of America five additional tracts of land, in fee simple, containing 74.72 acres. These deeds conveyed all the land owned by the Colossal Cavern Company in the Mammoth Cave area.

STEAMBOAT DAYS ON GREEN RIVER The system of locks and dams on Green River made it practicable about 1906 for steamboajts to navigate that stream, and many of the visitors to Mammoth Cave availed themselves of that delightful means of travel. Horace Hovey in his Handbook of the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, said "No more delightful river ride than this can be found in the middle west, or more diversified by frowning cliffs, wild forests, opening amphitheatres that smile in summer with rustling fields of corn, with here and there attractive villages and flourishing cities." Many people credit the "Hobson," a museum boat owned by Captain Berry, loaded with Civil War and other relics, with being the first steamboat to come up Green River to Mammoth Cave. The "Hobson" docked at the old ferry landing at Mammoth Cave probably soon after 1906 and remained there until it rotted away and sank. The boiler from the "Hobson" is said to have been removed to the Three Springs pumping station at Mammoth Cave. In 1880 Captain Richard T. Williams of Franklin County, Indiana, began steamboating on the Ohio River, running a small line of packets between Stephensport and Owensboro. Captain Williams, about 1898, came into Green River with one of his boats on which he had installed a mill for grinding corn and wheat for farmers who lived along the river banks. About 1900 Capt. Williams began operating The Evansville and Bowling Green Packet Company, a packet line between Evansville, Indiana and Bowling Green, Kentucky, and after 1906 began making regular excursion trips to Mammoth Cave. The "Chaperone" and the "Emma" were the two Evansville and Bowling Green Packet Company boats, piloted by Cap- 39 tain Williams or his son. Captain William N. Williams, that made the trips from Evansville to Bowling Green and on to Mammoth Cave and return. The "Chaperone" was a passenger and freight boat. She was built at Chambersburg, Ohio, in 1884, and ran from Paducah, then Evansville and later Louisville as the "J. C. Kerr," until 1904, when she was remodeled and named the "Chaperone." The "Emma" was a tow boat. The ten hour trip between Bowling Green and Mammoth Cave became a popular excursion trip. String bands were hired to furnish music and both Captain Williams and his son were genial hosts. Many tourists came from Bowling Green to Mammoth Cave by steamboat and returned by rail on the famous "Hercules" to Glasgow Junction and from there to Bowling Green on the L & N. In 1917 the "Chaperone" was taken off of Green River and sold. She was put on the Yazoo River in Mississippi under the name "Choctow," and burned in March, 1922. It is not known whether the "Emma" carried any passengers to Mam­ moth Cave after 1917, but the steamboat era in Mammoth Cave's history probably ended about that time as far as regular trips were concerned. The "Emma" and the "Canoy," were tow boats used for several years to haul railroad ties and lumber on Green River. In the early days hundreds of railroad ties, hand hewn from oak trees on the Mammoth Cave property, were delivered down the river for twenty-five cents apiece. For several years a rival steamboat line, called the Myers Packet Company, operated on Green River in competition with the Evansville and Bowling Green Packet Company, transporting passengers to and from Mammoth Cave, but the dates of its operation are not known.

THE NATIONAL PARK MOVEMENT As early as 1870 there were public rumblings against the private ownership of Mammoth Cave. Dr. Forwood in An Historical and Descriptive Narrative of the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, published in 1870 said, "It seems to be regarded by the public as an unfortunate disposition of the property that so many should be concerned in the ownership ... It is said that some of the proprietors are anxious to do one thing, some another, and some nothing . . . being unable to agree, nothing is done." The fame and popularity of Mammoth Cave during the 40 RUINS OF KARNAK pre-Civil War days and for some time thereafter, when from 30,000 to 40,000 people visited the caves annually, had built up in public minded citizens of the region a sense of pride in the cave and a feeling that the public had an interest in this great wonder. Under the terms of Dr. Groghan's will the cave estate was controlled and operated by trustees. The first active trustee was Senator Joseph R. Underwood of Bowling Green, Ken­ tucky. After his death members of the immediate family acted as trustees until about 1900 when Judge Albert J. Janin, husband of Violet Blair Janin, one of the heirs, assumed what amounted to practically sole management and control. Judge 41 Janin was, said one writer, "a gentleman of culture, and a lawyer of some attainments and ... for a quarter of a century he ruled the Mammoth Cave estate like any monarch." Judge Janin died in 1926. There was some dissatisfaction among the heirs over what some of them considered Judge Janin's arbitrary management of the estate and public resentment rose against what was termed ruthless cutting of much valuable timber on the prop­ erties. Several of the heirs, having only a life estate and no bodily heirs, were opposed to making improvements with the result that there was a gradual dilapidation of the buildings. U. S. Senator M. M. Logan, a native of the Mammoth Cave area, and Congressman James Richardson, took up the matter of making Mammoth Cave a national park with the Secretary of the Interior about 1905, and in 1908 the Secretary in his annual report stated that "such areas as Mammoth Cave in Kentucky are probably suitable as national parks." Visitation to Mammoth Cave by 1911 had decreased to between 8,000 and 9,000 annually and the early rumblings increased to a roar. This public spirited roar induced R. Y. Thomas, who suc­ ceeded James R. Richardson as Representative of the Third District of Kentucky, to introduce a bill HR1666 dated January 17, 1911, providing "that the Federal government take by condemnation or purchase the Mammoth Cave property con­ taining 1710 acres" and "such other lands as may be necessary" and convert them into a national park. Section 4 of this bill provided "That to enable the Secretary of War to begin to carry out this act, including the condemna­ tion and purchase of the necessary lands, roads and ap­ proaches, marking the boundaries of the park, opening or repairing necessary roads, maps and surveys, and the pay and expenses of the commissioners and their assistant, the sum of $1,000,000, or such portion thereof as may be necessary, but not exceeding $650,000 for purchase of land he hereby appro­ priated out of any money in the Treasury, not otherwise appro­ priated . . ." The Conservation Congress at Kansas City and the Greater Kentucky Convention held in Louisville during that year, were but two of the many state and national bodies unani­ mously indorsing the national park movement. Proponents of the project waxed eloquent in newspapers throughout the state and the Louisville, Kentucky Courier- Journal of January 28, 1912, carried a full page and a half 42 story by Emmet Garvin Logan on "Mammoth Cave and the Proposed National Park" in which the author said, "A much more ambitious and earnest movement than even legislators journalists and other leaders of public progress and exploita­ tion are aware of, is now afoot for the goal of having the Federal Government condemn and purchase Mammoth Cave for the use, enjoyment and edification of all the people of these United States and such of those of the other parts of the earth as will and can attend the greatest available exposi­ tion of wonders deep down in the bosom of the common mother of us all." Mr. Logan's article clearly pointed out the public attitude toward the continued private ownership and management of Mammoth Cave. "The old hotel," he wrote, "is today prac­ tically as it was nearly 100 years ago. The pigs and chickens come to the verandahs and beneath the windows to get their slops and crumbs . . . wood stoves provide heat in the winter, the adjacent river offers the baths of summer . . . The reasons for and causes of this state of innocuous desuetude into which this most wonderful of nature's gifts to man has fallen, are easily disclosed. The last owner of the property decreed that the overground and the underground interests should be under different and therefore inevitably antagonistic control until the last of the life-tenure heirs should die, which they persistently refuse to do, even up to this sixty-fourth year of the devise." A hearing on this bill was held May 3, 1912 before the Committee on Military Affairs, House of Representatives, 62nd Congress, but no action was taken. Senator Thomas introduced a number of bills in Congress after 1911 with no success. In the early part of 1919 the project secured fresh impetus, local clubs and organizations rallied to its support and on May 26th of that year Senator Thomas introduced Bill No. HR 3110, but still no action could be obtained. In annual reports for the years 1918, 1919 and 1920 the Director of the National Park Service, Mr. Stephen T. Mather, iridicated his approval of the Mammoth Cave National Park project. In his 1920 report he suggested the propriety of there being made federal appropriations for the purpose of purchasing the needed area and said in part, "Many efforts have been made in the past to secure the Mammoth Cave of Kentucky, with sufficient adjoining area, including the re­ cently discovered Onyx Cave, to permit of its full develop- 43 ment for a National Park, but thus far these efforts have been fruitless . . . more National Parks are needed in the east and the inclusion of the Mammoth Cave region would add one of the most remarkable of 'distinguished examples of typical forms of world architecture to the proud national park family'." Mr. Mather in his annual report for 1923 again advanced the need for additional parks east of the Mississippi, and as a result of his endeavors toward this end the Southern Appa­ lachian National Park Commission was appointed by Secretary of the Interior, Hubert Work, and approved by Congress on February 21, 1925. The Commission, in accordance with this act, made a survey of the three national park projects named in the act, namely, Shenandoah, Great Smoky Mountains and Mammoth Cave, and on April 8, 1926, made its unanimous report to the Secre­ tary of the Interior, declaring all three projects worthy of inclusion in our national park system, on the condition that the necessary lands be conveyed to the United States free of cost. The boundaries and area of the proposed Mammoth Cave National Park transmitted to the Congress by Secretary Work on April 14,1926, called for approximately 70,618 acres. In October, 1924, Milton H. Smith, Sr., George E. Zubrod, Senator Mills M. Logan, Max B. Nahm, Judge John B. Rodes and other interested people met at the Moorehead House in Bowling Green (now the Helm Hotel) and organized the Mammoth Cave National Park Association, for the purpose of urging Congress to establish a national park in the cave region of Kentucky. The first president of the Association was Senator Logan, who shortly thereafter resigned and was suc­ ceeded by Max B. Nahm. At this first meeting several thou­ sand dollars were raised and plans were formulated. Upon the advice of Henry W. Temple, Chairman of the Appalachian National Parks Commission, the Mammoth Cave National Park Association was incorporated July 16, 1925 in order to be in legal shape to carry out all necessary transactions toward the establishment of the Park. At the time of the organization of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association Mrs. Serena Croghan Rodgers, of California, was the only one of the original nine trustees under the will of Dr. John Croghan, still living, and she was past ninety years of age. As each of the original trustees died their successors in office were appointed by deed or will of the prior trustees or by a judgment of a Court of Equity, and 44 FLOWERING DOGWOOD IN MAMMOTH CAVE NATIONAL PARK at Mrs. Rodgers death August 27, 1926, the sole trustees were Wm. E. Wyatt and Violet Blair Janin, two of the sixteen heirs to the property. On April 8, 1926 Congressman Maurice H. Thatcher, pre­ sented a bill No. HR 12020 to the 69th Congress which pro­ vided that "when the lands of the Mammoth Cave region of Kentucky, recommended as a national park area by the commission, and comprising approximately 70,618 acres, shall have been vested in the United States, in fee simple, the same shall be established, dedicated and set apart as a public park for the benefit and enjoyment of the people." Hearings on the bill were held on May 11, 1926 at which Representative Thatcher, and others, including representatives Moore and Vinson of Kentucky, and Mr. Robert J. Ball, director and representative of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association, appeared and were heard in behalf of the measure. Senator Ernst of Kentucky introduced the duplicate 45 of the House bill in the Senate, and active support of the bill was given by Representatives Abernathy, Lotts and Sin- nott, and by Horace M. Albright, Director of the National Park Service. This bill, which became a law upon its approval by President Coolidge on May 25, 1926, further provided that a minimum of 20,000 acres would be accepted for federal jurisdiction without development but that a minimum acreage of 45,310 would be acceptable to the Department of the Interior for jurisdiction and development as a national park. The proposed 70,618 acres were to include Mammoth Cave and all the major cave units in that area, Floyd Collins Cave, Great Onyx Cave, New Entrance to Mammoth Cave, Salts Cave, Cave of the Hundred Domes, Proctor's Cave, Crystal Cave, Colossal Cav­ ern, Dixon Cave and several others. The passing of this bill inspired subscriptions amounting to approximately $800,000 in a campaign conducted by the Mammoth Cave National Park Association during the winter of 1927-28. The long era of promotion of the Mammoth Cave area as a national park passed into an era of acquisition with the passing of the Mammoth Cave National Park bill. It was variously estimated that between $2,000,000 and $4,000,000 would be needed to complete the Mammoth Cave National Park project. The Mammoth Cave National Park Association had no power of condemnation and at its instance the 1928 Legislature passed an act creating the first Kentucky National Park Commission to be appointed by the Governor. This Commission was given an appropriation of $30,000 to extend over a two year period for the purpose of surveying the needs of the National Park project. A. A. Demunbrun was chairman of the Commission and Judge George Newman of Hawesville, Secretary. The Mammoth Cave National Park Association on January 1, 1929, purchased a two-thirds interest in the Mammoth Cave estate, which two-thirds interest at this time was represented by Violet Blair Janin and Mary J. Sitgreaves, at a cost of $446,400. From 1929 until 1933 a sub-committee of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association operated Mammoth Cave together with a representative from the one-third private interest in the estate still unacquired. This committee was composed of George E. Zubrod and W. C. Montgomery, with Judge William Wyatt, representing the one-third private interest. 46 Following the method adopted by North Carolina and Ten­ nessee in their Great Smoky Mountains National Park project and Virginia in its Shenandoah project, application was made to the 1930 Legislature for an appropriation which would provide sufficient funds to establish the national park and to comply with the terms of the Congressional act. Under the Strange-McBrayer Act (Chapter 152, Carroll's Kentucky Statutes) the 1930 Legislature appropriated for a two year period 8% of the ad valorem tax for the benefit of the park project. This appropriation resulted in the sum of approximately $1,380,000. The 1930 Legislature under the Vincent-Strange Act (Chap­ ter 131, Carroll's Kentucky Statutes) created the Kentucky National Park Commission to be composed of nine members and appointed by the Governor from a list of eighteen names submitted by the Mammoth Cave National Park Association. This Commission was created to expend the legislative appro­ priation which, it was stated, could be expended only for lands, caves and condemnation expenses. It was understood that all other expenses were to be assumed by the Mammoth Cave National Park Association. The 1930 Legislature passed another bfll on March 22, 1930, with reference to the establishment of the park, known as the Jurisdiction Bill (Chapter 132, page 405, Carroll's Kentucky Statutes) which provided for the conveyance of the park area to the United States and the cession of jurisdiction over said area for national park purposes. Robert J. Ball, Louisville; Henning Chambers, Louisville; Alvan H. Clark, Hopkinsville; Otto C. Gartin, Ashland; S. French Hoge, Frankfort; H. L. Igleheart, Elizabethtown; Max B. Nahm, Bowling Green; Huston Quin, Louisville, and Earl Winters, Owensboro, were appointed by the Governor to serve on the Commission, with the Governor himself as ex- officio member. Mr. Winters was unable to serve and the Governor appointed Albert E. Ely of Glasgow in his stead. The Commission held its first meeting on April 5, 1930, and elected the following officers, Huston Quin, chairman. Max B. Nahm, vice chairman, Blakey Helm, treasurer, and W. W. Thompson, secretary. Mr. Helm was unable to serve and Mr. Robert J. Ball was elected treasurer. The 1930 Legislature visited Mammoth Cave shortly after its adjournment and during the spring of 1930 the park area was visited by Horace M. Albright and Amo B. Cammerer, Director and Associate Director of the National Park Service. 47 Col. Cammerer visited the area several times and outlined the minimum boundary of 45,310 acres. In order to acquire the remaining one-third of the Mammoth Cave estate still unacquired, the Commission, in 1930, con­ demned the entire cave, with the understanding that it would not be required to pay for the two-thirds interest previously bought by the Association. In the condemnation proceedings in the Edmonson District Court, a jury valued the entire cave at $700,000, and the one-third interest, represented by Judge William Wyatt, came into possession of the Commission for $233,333.33. On payment of a balance of $111,691.66 by the Commission, which was a balance owed by the Association on its two-thirds purchase, and in return for the right to operate Mammoth Cave until turned over to the federal government, the Association conveyed its interest in the cave to the Kentucky National Park Commission. The Commission then paid a further sum of $91,666.67 to the owners of the remaining one-third interest in complete settlement. On January 5, 1931 the Commission purchased the New Entrance, then known as Frozen Niagara, for the sum of $290,000. This purchase included the New Entrance Hotel, 290 acres in fee, 11 acres of surface rights and 604 acres of cave rights. From 1931 to 1934 Frozen Niagara was operated by a com­ mittee of the Kentucky National Park Commission composed of Max B. Nahm, Joe Richardson and H. L. Igleheart. The old entrance was operated by a committee of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association composed of George E. Zubrod, W. C. Montgomery and Albert E. Ely. In 1933 the two bodies formed a joint committee to operate both entrances, which was known as the Joint Operating Commitee, and from that date until 1941 all the Mammoth Cave properties were operated by a joint operating committee. The first members of this joint committee were Robert J. Ball, L. B. Knight, Max Nahm, W. C. Montgomery and W. W. Thompson, secretary. In 1934 Charles L. Gable, Chief of the Park Operators Division of the National Park Service, and R. S. Bragg, federal land buyer, were added. The operating committee, in 1941, was composed of six members, Robert J. Ball, Eugene Stuart, Max Nahm, Joe Richardson, Charles L. Gable and R. S. Bragg. The Mammoth Cave area was visited in the spring of 1931 by the House Sub-committee on Appropriations for national parks. The party was composed of Congressman Frank Murphy, Ohio, chairman; Congressman Addison T. Smith, 48 Idaho, chairman. House Reclamation Committee; Congress­ man Scott Leavitt, Montana, Chairman Indian Affairs Com­ mittee; E. K. Burlow, Asst. Secretary of the Interior; Frederick J. Bailey, Asst. Director of Budget; A. E. Demaray, Senior Assistant Director, National Park Service, and WiUiam A. Duvall, Clerk of the Visiting Committee. They were accom­ panied on their inspection of the park area by Governor Flem D. Sampson, Senator Alben W. Barkley, Congressman John W. Moore and Congressman Maurice H. Thatcher. All of these men expressed the desire to help Kentucky in every way and signified a willingness to work for the development of the Mammoth Cave National Park. Under a bill introduced by Congressman Maurice H. Thatcher, an appropriation of $25,000 was made by Congress providing for a topographical survey of the park area. This survey was made under the jurisdiction of Col. Glenn S. Smith of the U. S. Geological Survey and Secretary of the Southern Appalachian Park Commission. The Legislature, in 1934, made a further appropriation of $250,000 and shortly thereafter President Franklin D. Roose­ velt allocated to the Mammoth Cave project the sum of $300,000 from reforestation funds for the purchase of lands. It soon became apparent, however, that all of the minimum acreage required to make Mammoth Cave a national park would never be acquired by condemnation suit in local courts by the Kentucky National Park Commission and that this obligation should be assumed by the federal government so that the suits could be brought in federal court. It was also evident that the lands and surface attractions already acquired should be protected against vandalism and fire hazards. With these problems in mind a joint committee of the Kentucky National Park Commission and the Mammoth Cave National Park Association attended also by Director Amo Cammerer and other officials of the National Park Service, met on May 28, 1934, and made the following agreements: (1) The National Park Service agreed to take over the obli­ gation of purchasing the remaining land. (2) All funds then belonging to the Commission and the Association and all future income of both bodies would be turned over to the Park Service for the purpose of purchasing lands. (3) All lands belonging to both the Association and the Com­ mission with the minimum boundary and all lands that might be acquired in the future would be turned over to the 49 National Park Service except the temporary reservation of such cave rights as are mutually agreed upon between the Kentucky National Park Commission and the National Park Service. It was stated that these reservations were made so that the earnings of the properties could be turned over by the Commission to the National Park Service rather than to the general treasury of the United States, which would be the situation if all properties were turned over, therefore making necessary a Congressional appropriation to get back for the benefit of the Park the earnings which would be pro­ vided for that purpose. (4) All Association lands would be turned over to the Com­ mission and the Mammoth Cave National Park Association would be cancelled. (5) The lease between the Kentucky National Park Com­ mission and the Mammoth Cave National Park Association would be cancelled. (6) The Association would retain its interests in the properties to be temporarily reserved by the Commission, these interests being jointly operated with the Commission. (7) All funds would be consolidated and turned over to the National Park Service as above mentioned excepting only such funds as are needed for the operation of the cave and allied hotel enterprises and to take care of outstanding obli­ gations, meeting expenses, office personnel, auditing expenses, and administration expenses. At this meeting Director Cammerer agreed to appoint two representatives to act as members of the Mammoth Cave Operating Committee to serve with two members elected annually by the Kentucky National Park Commission and two members of the Mammoth Cave National Park Associa­ tion. It was also agreed that the National Park Service would assume the protection of all park lands provided the expense of such protection were assumed from the earnings of the properties. Under these agreements, after May, 1934, the National Park Service began the condemnation and purchase of the necessary lands and the Mammoth Cave properties were op­ erated by the Mammoth Cave Operating Committee as stated above. On March 16,1936 Senator Wagner of New York introduced a bill to place lands acquired by the Government for addition to Mammoth Cave National Park under control of the National Park Service, and on May 22, 1936, the Park was formally 50 accepted by the Secretary of the Interior for administration and protection and given the status of a National Park with the understanding that no regular government funds would be forthcoming either for administration, protection or de­ velopment until all lands had been acquired under the act of 1926. A minor obstacle to the fulfillment of the entire plan for the Park was presented by the price set on privately ovsmed Great Onyx and Crystal Caves, which were within the mini­ mum boundary. However, an act of Congress on August 28, 1937 (44 Sta. 635. 16 U.S.C. Sec. 404) provided that these two caves could be excluded from the national park at the discretion of the Secretary of the Interior. Inasmuch as no funds were available for the purchase of these two caves. Secretary Harold L. Ickes on December 3, 1940, signed an order excluding them from the national park, and the way

FERRY AND SIGHTSEEING BOATS ON GREEN RIVER was paved for the area to acquire full national park status. The minimum acreage of 45,310 acres was acquired by July 1, 1941, and the area was declared a national park on that date.

DEDICATION Mammoth Cave achieved National Park status July 1, 1941 when it had acquired the minimum required acreage for National Park Service administration, protection and develop­ ment, but formal dedication, on account of the war, was not made until September 18, 1946, when it became the nation's 26th national park. The dedication ceremonies began at 1:45 p. m. on a small platform erected about a quarter of a mile from the Mammoth Cave Hotel. Before a crowd of about 2500 persons Governor Simeon Willis of Kentucky presented the park to the United States government, through Secretary of the Interior, Julius A. Krug. The 45 minute ceremony was presided over by A. E. Demaray, Associate Director, National Park Service, and after the invocation by Dr. Charles W. Welch of Louisville, remarks were made by the Hon. Earle C. Clements, 2nd District, Kentucky; Hon. Frank L. Chelf, 4th District, Kentucky (the park lies in both districts); Eugene Stuart, Chairman, Dedica­ tion Executive Committee; and former Representative Maurice H. Thatcher, author of the bill establishing Mammoth Cave National Park. Senator Alben W. Barkley, of Kentucky, in­ troduced Secretary Krug, who made the dedication address. The 158th Armored Ground Force Band from Fort Knox played "My Old Kentucky Home" near the beginning of the ceremony and "The Star Spangled Banner" before the bene­ diction by the Rev. Joseph L. Wheatley. Many state and federal dignitaries and others who had worked over a long period of years were on hand to witness this ceremony which represented the fruit of long and earnest labor extending over nearly a century. These included ex- Congressman Maurice H. Thatcher; Senator Alben W. Barkley; R. M. Watt, chairman, Kentucky National Park Commission; Eugene Stuart, President, Mammoth Cave National Park As­ sociation; Max B. Nahm of Bowling Green, who had been active in promoting the national park for over fifty years; and H. St. G. T. Carmichael. Tribute was paid to those national park promoters who had not lived to see their dream realized by Eugene Stuart who read a memorial list of such workers, headed by the name of George E. Zubrod, former real estate 52 agent for the L & N Railroad Company, and who had been secretary of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association from its formation until his death in 1942. A luncheon at the Mammoth Cave Hotel given in honor of Governor Willis and Secretary Krug by the Mammoth Gave National Park Association and the Kentucky National Park Commission, preceded the dedication ceremonies. In presenting the park to the nation Governor Willis quoted Irvin S. Cobb's description of Mammoth Cave as "an open mouth to proclaim the glories of Kentucky, and an open door to her hospitality." Secretary Krug, accepting the area said in part, "I am happy to accept Mammoth Cave National Park on behalf of the President of the United States. The Depart­ ment of the Interior and the National Park Service gladly accept the obligation to safeguard all those things which give it distinction, to the best of our ability; and to make it con­ tribute as fully and effectively as we can, to the benefit and enjoyment of the people . . . Mammoth Cave was known for several decades as one of the seven wonders of the world . . . it has been longer known, has been famous over a longer period of years, than any other national park." Each of the speakers told of some phase of the park's history and development, and Mr. Thatcher expressed the hope that the day was not far distant when the Blue Ridge Parkway would ultimately connect Mammoth Cave with its sister national parks east of the Mississippi River and with other scenic spots such as Cumberland Gap and Cumberland Falls State Park. Cave City, Kentucky, in honor of the dedication, welcomed visitors with banners strung across its main street, and the L & N Railroad Company, whose interest in the national park project dated back to 1886, stopped all its main line trains except the South Wind, at Cave City. A reception and dinner for Governor Willis and others given by the Cave City Chamber of Commerce wound up the day's festivities. After Mammoth Cave was formally dedicated the Mam­ moth Cave National Park Association and the Kentucky National Park Commission continued to function as separate bodies, co-operating with the National Park Service in de­ veloping the Mammoth Cave National Park.

CONCESSIONS HISTORY Between 1929, when the last heir under the will of Dr. John Croghan died, and 1934, all public facilities at Mammoth 53 Cave were operated under various arrangements through individual or joint management by the Mammoth Cave National Park Association and the Kentucky National Park Commission. Martin L. Charlet was employed to manage the hotel from 1915 to 1929 when he added the duties of cave manager to the hotel operation and took care of both hotel and cave until 1934. In 1934 management of the hotel was take nover by Lemuel Ferguson, former manager of the New Entrance Hotel. Mr. Ferguson operated the hotel from June, 1934 until December, 1935, after which time Olin Hanson, clerk at the Hotel, took charge until February, 1936. From 1934 general management of both the hotel and the caves was under the Mammoth Cave Operating Committee, which was formed that year and consisted of two members of the Kentucky National Park Commission, two members of the Mammoth Cave National Park Association and two mem­ bers of the National Park Service, with W. W. "Bill" Thompson as General Manager. Mr. Thompson remained as General Manager until 1944 when he assumed a position as Relief Administrator of the Balkans. In February, 1936, Henry S. Sanborn, resort manager at Lake Arrowhead, California, was employed, with his wife, Beulah Brown Sanborn, to take over the active management of the Mammoth Cave Hotel. Both Mr. and Mrs. Sanborn were veteran resort and national park operators and had been associated with the operation of concessions in Yellowstone National Park, Death Valley and Lake Arrowhead. Recognizing the need for organizations to furnish adequate facilities at reasonable rates, under Government supervision, in national areas, several National Park Service officials, among them A. E. Demaray, Assistant Director, A. J. Knox, Attorney in the Chief Counsel's office, and Charles L. Gable, Chief of Park Operator's Division, organized National Park Conces­ sions, Inc. in 1941, just prior to the establishment of Mammoth Cave as a national park. The Corporation was authorized by Harold L. Ickes, Secre­ tary of the Interior, to operate the concessions at Mammoth Cave National Park, and was organized under the laws of the State of Delaware as a non profit distributing corporation. It is a membership corporation, limited to five members, who are also the directors. 54 The three ranking executives in direct charge of the opera­ tions when the Corporation was organized, W. W. Thompson, H. S. Sanborn and Beulah B. Sanborn, were invited to consti­ tute a majority of the Corporation's Board of Directors, and these three, together with two representatives of the National Park Service, A. J. Knox and Charles L. Gable, constituted the Corporation. W. W. Thompson was designated as presi­ dent and general manager; Henry S. Sanborn as treasurer; Beulah B. Sanborn as secretary, and Charles L. Gable and A. J. Knox, directors, completed the directorate. The Corporation began operating pubhc facilities in Mam­ moth Cave National Park on June 21, 1941. Henry S. Sanborn became president and general manager of the Corporation in 1944, which position he still holds. Other members of the present Board of Directors are Beulah B. Sanborn, secretary; A. E. Demaray, treasurer; A. J. Knox, Counsel, National Park Service, director, and Thomas J. Allen, Asst. Director, National Park Service, director. The Corporation now operates services for the public in five national parks. Mammoth Cave, Olympic, Everglades, Isle Royale and Big Bend, at the Roosevelt-Vanderbilt Na­ tional Historic Site at Hyde Park, N. Y. and along the Blue Ridge Parkway, with general offices at the Mammoth Cave Hotel. Services provided by National Park Concessions, Inc. at Mammoth Cave consist of the Mammoth Cave Hotel, Dining Room and Coffee Shop, ten cottages adjacent to the Hotel, 41 cabin rooms, a service station, photo shop, souvenir shop, bus transportation to cave entrances and luncheon service in the Snowball Dining Room in Mammoth Cave.

OUTSTANDING EVENTS AND CELEBRATIONS National Park Service participation in the administration of Mammoth Cave began in 1934 when Director Cammerer agreed to appoint two representatives of the National Park Service to serve with two members of the Kentucky National Park Commission and the Mammoth Cave National Park Association as a joint operating committee to operate the properties. The period between 1934 and 1941, when full national park status was obtained, were eventful and important years in the development of the park. 55 On June 7, 1935 two Mammoth Cave guides, Grover Camp­ bell and Lyman Cutliff made an important archaeological discovery. While exploring the cave their search led them to Waldach's Dome to see some mummified bats which Camp­ bell had found there the day before. Campbell crawled down between some rocks along a sand ledge and pushed his head between two large stones to see what lay beyond in the darkness. He rested his left hand on what he supposed was a stone, but what turned out, in the light of the lantern, to be a mummy of an Indian gypsum miner, pinned beneath a huge rock. Elated at their find and realizing the significance of it the Director of the National Park Service was notified. Under the supervision of Alonzo W. Pond, archaeologist, the body of the prehistoric Indian was freed from the six ton burden it had carried for over five hundred years, and placed in a glass case in the cave where it may be viewed by park visitors. An important development during 1935 was the completion of the eight mile route connecting the Historic Entrance to Mammoth Cave with the Frozen Niagara Entrance. Dedica­ tion exercises were held celebrating the event on July 8 of that year in the Snowball Dining Room. The first underground radio broadcast in history was made on that date from the Snowball Dining Room by WHAS radio technicians, Emmet Graft and Karl Schmidt. A successful radio test was made in Mammoth Cave on July 21, 1923 by a WHAS technician, and a bronze tablet marks the spot two miles from the Historic Entrance and 378 feet below the surface. The first all-day trip from the Historic Entrance through the cave and out the New Entrance was made May 11th, 1935. Nationwide interest was centered on Mammoth Cave from June 4 to July 7, 1938 when two University of Chicago psy­ chologists endeavored to find out, 119 feet below the surface in Mammoth Cave, whether or not man could forget the normal cycles of life. Dr. Nathaniel Kleitman, of the Depart­ ment of Psychology, University of Chicago and Bruce Rich­ ardson, a post graduate there, lived on Audubon Avenue in the main passageway in Mammoth Cave for twenty-eight days, keeping scientific data on each other's behavior as they sought to adjust themselves to a 28 hour day. The object of the experiment was to determine whether or not man isolated from the 24 hour day as it is lived on the surface, and from the regular recurring phenomena of sunrise and sunset, etc. could adjust himself to a 28 hour schedule. The scientists announced 56 a 50% success with the experiment and Dr. Kleitman later published a book. Sleep and Wakefulness,^which included his experiments in Mammoth Cave. The National Park Service, on July 8, 1940, officially an­ nounced the discovery, on October 10, 1938, by four cave guides, Carl and Pete Hanson, Leo and Claude Hunt, of the miles of hitherto unknown avenues in Mammoth Cave now known as the "New Discovery." The outstanding phenomenon in the New Discovery, aside from miles of spectacular main cave avenues, is the labyrinth of gypsum flower gardens. Development of the "New Discovery" is still pending and it is not open to the public. There have been few important boundary changes or addi­ tions since Mammoth Cave was made a national park, but small additional inholdings were acquired as late at February, 1948, to give the present federal acreage of 50,695.73, with 658.67 acres of private inholdings remaining within the ex­ terior boundaries.

PHYSICAL DEVELOPMENTS When the Mammoth Cave properties were taken over from private interests they were almost unsuitable for use and many improvements were initiated. Of the approximately 50,000 acres in the park, about 22,000 or 45% were cleared fields in various stages of erosion or of plant succession when the government assumed administration and protection of the area. A comprehensive reforestation plan was initiated to provide a means of erasing these scars. The Civilian Conservation Corps proved a boon for the park project and rendered valuable assistance to the park from May 22, 1933 to July, 1942, in soil and moisture con­ servation work and construction of physical improvements and roads and trails. Under normal conditions no develop­ ments could have been made by the federal government until the area had achieved full park status. A maximum of four CCC camps were operated in the park, consisting mainly of between 500 and 600 youths. When the first contingent of CCC enrollees arrived the only roads in the park were old wagon trails and were im­ passable during the winter and spring months except on horseback or on foot. There was no communication system, no quarters for personnel, and only a dilapidated water system. Since CCC days the principal physical developments have been the construction of dormitories and cabins for employees 57 at back of the hotel; six huts and five cabins for guest ac­ commodations; shower rooms have been installed in picnic area and a garbage house built at rear of the hotel. Asphalt walks have replaced old gravel walks in administra­ tion, hotel and cabin areas, and in some parts of Mammoth Cave. On December 26, 1951 the New Entrance, originally opened in 1923 and closed since 1941 was added to the Frozen Niagara trip. The most impressive features of this new section are the magnificent pits and domes through which a stairway descends. All retracing on this trip was eliminated and some trails rerouted so that the visitor by entering through the New Entrance and emerging at the Frozen Niagara Entrance gets a better idea of the scope of Mammoth Cave. The policies affecting the development and use of Mammoth Cave National Park have, ever since about 1816, changed with the vagaries of each of the succession of owners and frequent change of managers. This applies to both cave management and surface management. It was not until 1934 when the Mammoth Cave Operating Committee began to function that the management of all of the properties within the Mammoth Cave park area was centered in one operating body. Long range policies and plans could then be formulated for the development of the park and carried out with a unity of purpose. After 1941 when the government assumed full management and control a master plan was worked out by the National Park Service engineers for Mammoth Cave National Park which called for long term expansion, development and use of the park. INTERPRETATION OF THE PARK From 1816 until about 1935 there was little attempt at interpretation of the Mammoth Cave area other than the showing of the caves, with the possible exception of the museum boat "Hobson" docked at the old ferry landing and containing many relics of the area. These museum objects, however, were almost esoteric, since there was little effort to do anything other than have them for display. Guides in the cave, at their own discretion and pleasure told something of the history of the caves. Some of the early guides became famous for their colorful versions and accounts of earlier happenings and in many cases these guide stories are the only existing records of discoveries in the caves. However, since the talks were not compulsory and were 58 SNOWBALL DINING ROOM IN MAMMOTH CAVE completely unrehearsed, legend and hearsay were combined with fact. With the beginning of acquisition of the park by the state and the government, more attention was paid to proper interpretation of both the caves and the surface area. CCC workers started the construction of surface scenic trails and the first one was completed August 30, 1935. A ranger naturalist. Dr. Albert S. Wilkerson, was employed in July, 1939, to explain and interpret Mammoth Cave National Park through guided nature walks, illustrated evening lectures and identffi- cation of native trees, flowers, birds and wildlife. Dr. Wilker­ son was followed by Arthur C. Lundahl in the summers of 1940 and 1941, Vincent E. Nelson in the summer of 1942; Henry J. Lix in 1943 and Courtland T. Reid in June, 1951. Interpretation of the park consists of initial visitor recep­ tion, cave trips and talks by guides, museum, nature walks and lectures, scenic boat trips and publications. Conducted cave trips consist of: Trip No. 1, Echo River, 59 takes the visitor to the saltpeter vats of 1812, Bottomless Pit, Fat Man's Misery, Mammoth Dome, Ruins of Karnak and the Corkscrew. Length, 3 miles, time, IVz to 3 hours. Shown by lantern and torches. Starts from Historic Entrance. Trip No. 2, Frozen Niagara and New Entrance. The visitor enters the New Entrance and emerges at the Frozen Niagara En­ trance. This trip shows Roosevelt Dome, King Solomon's Temple, Frozen Niagara, Drapejy Room, Crystal Lake and Onyx Colonnade. Length % miles, time, 1% hours. Elec­ trically lighted. Trip No. 3, Historical. Starts from Historic Entrance. Shows the Rotunda, Saltpeter vats, Bridal Altar, Jenny Lind's Armchair and Martha Washington's Statue. Length, 2 miles, time, 2 hours. This trip has been temporarily and indefinitely suspended until sufficient extra guides are obtained. Trip No. 4. All day trip. The trip comprises most of the outstanding features of the cave. Length 7 miles, time, about 7 hours. Begins at Historic Entrance, ends at Frozen Niagara Entrance. Lunch is served in Snowball Dining Room, 267 feet underground. Shown by lanterns, torches and elec­ tric lights. Talks are given on all cave tours which in general tie in with cave features so that guides point out the particular historic or natural features and give general information about the caves, rules and regulations. There has been a very definite need for an interpretative museum at Mammoth Cave for many years. Because of the lack of a suitable building and money for equipment and personnel, an important collection of museum material, owned by the government, consisting of both historic and prehistoric items, has been stored in boxes in a warehouse and the collec­ tion as a valuable aid in the proper interpretation of the park has been lost. This collection was bought by the Mammoth Cave National Park Association January 15, 1942 from John M. Nelson, and given to the National Park Service. Recently Superintendent Thomas C. Miller designated a room in the old engineer's building to be used as a temporary museum, which was opened on April 11, 1952. This museum is expected to become the interpretative center for the park. Nature walks are conducted under the supervision of the park naturalist, over the eight miles of wooded trails near park headquarters. Lectures are given each evening in the amphitheatre adja­ cent to the hotel or in the Blue Room of the hotel from May 60 BOONE AVENUE

15th through October 1st. These talks concern regional geology, flora and fauna of the park, what to do in the park, and other national parks. All are accompanied by kodaslides pertaining to the subject matter. On May 15, 1952 sightseeing boat service was inaugurated by Willard M. Fletcher of the Everglades Park Transway 61 THE MAMMOTH CAVE HOTEL

Service, on Green River in the park. The sightseeing boats are Diesel, fibre glass boats which seat twenty-four persons. These boat trips make the scenic beauty of the Green and Nolin Rivers in the park accessible to many thousands of park visitors every year. A three fold park folder, a general information leaflet with map of surface trails, fishing regulation leaflet, cave picture taking information leaflet, vicinity map and mileage charts are available to park visitors. These printed pages are but the beginning of the history of Mammoth Cave National Park, its story is still being written. After nearly a century and a half of exploitation Mammoth Cave National Park is still in the embryonic stage of development. Hundreds of uncharted cave miles await more adventurous explorers, the scenic beauty of forested park lands and rivers are waiting to be made more accessible to untold thousands of future park visitors. This development, directed toward the pleasure, conveni­ ence and comfort ot the park visitor, is the aim and purpose of future planning, for, in the words of Robert Bradford Marshall, "A National Park, preserved in all its beauty and at the same time made accessible to the public for all time, is as grand a heritage as it is possible to leave to future gen­ erations." 62 ^1

RUINS OF OLD SALTPETER VATS IN MAMMOTH CAVE

MUMMY DISCOVERED IN MAMMOTH CAVE IN 1935 63 NATIONAL PARK SERVICE SUPERINTENDENTS AND THEIR TENURE OF DUTY AT MAMMOTH CAVE NATIONAL PARK ROBERT P. HOLLAND, Acting Superintendent, Sept. 2,1936 to June 22,1938 R. TAYLOR HOSKINS, Acting Superintendent, June 23,1938 to June 30, 1941 R. TAYLOR HOSKINS, Superintendent, July 1, 1941 to March 31, 1951 THOMAS C. MILLER, Superintendent, March 1, 1951 to date •ipi^> >

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