subscribe
Apple | Spotify | Amazon |iHeart Radio | cast box | Podcast Republic | RSS | Patreon | fluoride | Facebook | IMDB
podcast transcript
In the early 20th century, Kentucky’s caves became the center of a violent underground gold rush.
At the center of it all was Mammoth Cave, a treasure so valuable that people risked their fortunes, reputations, and even their lives to control a piece of it.
That struggle eventually turned deadly and helped shape the future of one of America’s greatest natural wonders.
Learn more about the Kentucky Cave Wars in this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.
The story of the Kentucky Cave Wars is one of tourism gone awry centered around Mammoth Cave, the world’s largest cave system.
The Mammoth Cave System is the longest known cave system in the world. It is over 426 miles or 685 kilometers long, which is one and a half times the length of the next largest cave system. Its value is not even a definitive number, as parts of the cave remain unexplored.
The cave is located in south-central Kentucky. Most of the system is currently located within Mammoth Cave National Park, established in 1941.
Caves began developing about 330 million years ago. It is believed that it was once part of an ancient sea, and rock and fossil evidence found there supports this theory.
The walls of the cave are composed of Early Carboniferous limestone, shale, dolomite, and siltstone, topped by a layer of sandstone. This sediment composition made the cave walls incredibly stable.
Inside the cave, anthropologists were able to identify Native American remains dating back about 5,000 years. They were found mummified, believed to have been placed in caves as part of burial practices.
The first written record of the cave system dates back to the 1790s, after a man named Thomas Lang Jr. sold the land. It is believed that the cave was not discovered by settlers until 1797.
The legend of how this system was discovered in Europe is as follows: John or Francis Houchin or Francis Houchin were hunting in the area when one of them spotted a bear. One of the Houchins decided to follow the bear to the cave entrance, and voila, the Mammoth Cave System was discovered.
Now whether this is an actual discovery of a cave system is debatable. Numerous caves have already been discovered surrounding the Mammoth star system, one of which is about a mile away. But as far as we know, this was the best guess we had.
In 1798, the land on which the cave entrance was located was surveyed and registered by Valentine Simon, and he began exploring the cave in search of deposits of saltpeter used in the manufacture of gunpowder.
Through the early 1800s, the caves became an important military resource for producing saltpeter and a lucrative asset for their owners.
Over the centuries, the cave changed ownership several times, but one notable owner was Franklin Gorin, who purchased the cave in 1838.
At this point, the need for nitrates had diminished, which gave Gorin the idea of turning the cave into a tourist attraction. He planned to use slaves as tour guides to show visitors around.
One of these slaves was Stephen Bishop, which is one of the main reasons we have so much information about the cave. While having to guide tourists around, Bishop created detailed maps of the caves and named many notable features within the system.
Gorin eventually sold the cave and the slaves who worked there to John Croghan, a physician. For a short period Croghan attempted to run a tuberculosis hospital. This was a very bad idea, as Croghan eventually contracted tuberculosis and died from this effort.
After Croghan passed away, Bishop was sent to a farm in Louisville, Kentucky. While on this farm, Bishop drew a map of the caves from memory, which was later published as a book in 1844. Unlike the work of many slaves, Bishop was credited with the records, which were the main records used for the next 40 years.
Despite the lack of modern technology, the maps are said to have been very accurate. The distances and sizes of the caves may vary slightly, but the topography and branch connections were very accurate.
Interestingly, when the Mammoth Cave system was discovered to be connected to the Flint Ridge Cave system over 100 years later in 1972, it was revealed that Bishop had recorded the passage on a map.
Fast forward to the cave war.
The Kentucky Cave Wars began in the late 19th century. At this point, Mammoth Cave was already one of the most popular tourist attractions in the United States. The caves were mainly visited by wealthy travelers who arrived by train or stagecoach to witness its wonders.
Meanwhile, many locals in the surrounding Appalachian region were living in poverty and saw an opportunity to own and operate a show cave.
This was an attractive idea for locals, as there were few opportunities to make money outside of the tourism industry. Many people wanted to take advantage of this, and it became a race to find the next large cave entrance to promote. This meant that by the 1920s there were dozens of different show caves run by different people.
Those who ran show caves were incredibly competitive, and many local owners used questionable tactics to generate as much tourist revenue as possible. If you don’t put in the extra effort to find and promote your cave, you won’t be successful.
If you want to be a cave operator, you can’t just have an old cave entrance. A little extravagance or flair was needed to attract tourists. To be successful, the goal was to find openings with mineral deposits, stalactites and stalagmites.
Location was also important. Caves close to railroad tracks were more profitable because they were easier to access. Some of Mammoth Caverns’ early competitors, such as Diamond Caverns and Hundred Dome Cave, were famous for their ease of access and the spectacular terrain within them.
After the invention of the automobile, opportunities for cave owners expanded. In the early 20th century, automobiles became increasingly popular, and suddenly being located on the tracks became less important. This meant that other spectacular caves in the area also had a chance to compete, as people could actually access them.
These entrepreneurs quickly learned that to profit from the caves, they had to be connected to the main Mammoth cave system. Tourists don’t come to the Mammoth area to see the old caves. They wanted to see a connection to the source. Therefore, if you wanted to make money, the best way was to find the back entrance to Mammoth Cave.
The first major contender for the entrance to Mammoth Cave was Colossal Cavern. Opened in the early 20th century, the Colossal Cavern was considered to be approximately the same size as the main entrance to Mammoth Cave. The owners of Colossal Cavern were also ambitious and sought to connect their cave system to the Mammoth cave system, creating a second entry point that could compete with Mammoth’s main entrance.
Unfortunately for the Colossal Cavern owners, they were never able to clear their way to the Mammoth System. Later studies showed that it was actually very close to breaching, but never did, so the cave’s popularity waned.
But the idea inspired another cave entrepreneur, George Morrison. Like the owner of the Colossal Cavern, Morrison wanted to break into the Mammoth Cave system, open a second entrance and profit from it.
Instead of blindly digging as he would in a giant cave, Morrison physically searched the giant cave system for potential exit points into his cave.
To do so, he bribed Mammoth’s guide and set out to find a map. In 1922, he opened the second entrance to Mammoth Cave, and from then on the real cave wars began.
At the main entrance to Mammoth Cave, the owners felt as if a competitor was trying to take their business away and had to fight back.
It has become common to hire “cappers” to entice people to visit specific caves. The term “cappers” has been used to define ruthless ticket sellers who intercept tourist vehicles and force people to visit caves they owned or worked.
To advertise the caves, cappers used a variety of drastic methods.
One method Capper used was to dress up as a police officer to lead tourists away from the main entrance to Mammoth Cave. They parked on the road leading to Mammoth Cave and claimed it was closed, often citing quarantine. From there, they attempted to guide tourists into their caves.
Other cappers posed as tourists and overestimated the caves in which they worked. The goal was to drum up excitement for one’s tour and to keep others away from the cave’s main entrance.
Another tactic used by cappers dressed as tourists was to spread rumors that a large fire had broken out in Mammoth Cave and encourage people to divert to the entrance.
There were other extreme measures taken, for example as the boat headed down the river towards the Mammoth system. To prevent tourists from visiting the main entrance to Mammoth Cave, some cappers threw stones at incoming boats.
Other extreme measures included blocking roads, destroying enemy cave entrances, and burning convention ticket booths.
An extreme method used by cappers was to approach tourists and tell them that the cave entrances are identical because they are all connected by the same system. Although this is not true, the rumor was enough to induce some tourists to change their minds about going through Mammoth’s main entrance and opt for one of the smaller caves.
In an effort to protect their money, the owners of the main cave entrance went to court and claimed that other cave owners, most notably Morrison, were using the cave’s name to advertise the entrance, which was illegal advertising.
For tourists, the chaos surrounding the massive cave system was incredibly frustrating. They will be bombarded with signs and people telling them to visit caves with almost identical names. Well, this is actually intended by the cave operators as it makes it difficult to visit the intended destination.
On one occasion in 1921, the rivalry became heated when an argument broke out between employees of the rival caves. The argument ended with one of the employees shooting and killing him.
The Kentucky Cave War reached its peak in 1925, centered around an entrepreneur named Floyd Collins.
Collins and his family previously owned Crystal Cave. His family invested a lot of money in Crystal Cave, but it failed, so to get that money back and more, Collins decided to find a new place known as Sand Cave.
While exploring the inside of a sand cave, he got stuck in a narrow passage and was pinned to the ground by a rock. The press was fascinated by this story and went to the cave to cover it. As media coverage continued, more people flocked to the Kentucky cave and the entire situation drew national attention.
Collins died in the cave, and his body was removed 18 days later. You’d think his death would put people off exploring the caves, but the reality was quite the opposite.
Rather, criminals in Kentucky sought to profit from the gruesome nature of his death. The new owners of Crystal Cave exhumed Collins’ body and put it on display in 1927. The glass coffin placed inside the cave has become a popular tourist attraction.
When the United States designated Mammoth Cave as a national park in 1941, it was believed it would bring an end to the cave wars, but that did not happen.
Instead, private landowners in Kentucky tried to compete with national parks for attention. This continued for about 20 years until the Cave Wars officially ended in the 1960s. At that point, it became more advantageous for Capper to partner with Mammoth Cave National Park in a cross-promotional strategy.
The Kentucky Cave War was a strange chapter in American history, but it was also a very human event. It was about ambition, poverty, tourism, deception, and the desire to control the wonders hidden beneath the earth.
Today, Mammoth Cave is protected as a national park, but its preservation came after decades of confusion, competition, and sacrifice.
