Ohio Caverns
Encyclopedia
Ohio Caverns is a show cave
located 30 miles (48.3 km) from Dayton, Ohio
near West Liberty
, in Salem Township, Champaign County, Ohio
in the United States
. A popular tourist destination and member of the National Caving Association, it is the largest of all the cave systems in Ohio
and contains many crystal
formations. Approximately 90% of its stalactite
and stalagmite
formations are still active. The cavern system was originally an aquifer
, holding an underground river of melted glacier water. This river eventually receded to lower levels of the ground and is now unseen.
-age bedrock surrounded by Silurian
-age carbonates. Most recently it has been proposed that in post-Devonian times there was a set of active parallel faults that down-dropped a block of Logan County, forming a graben
, also called a rift valley.
Continued erosion of several glaciers would have been concentrated on areas around the graben, leaving this area without its protective layer of Bedford shale
and more susceptible to erosion. The sunken graben area then became a topographical high, now the highest point in Ohio at the elevation of 1549 feet above sea level.
in the woods and, curious, decided to investigate. Noffsinger dug a few feet of soil until he hit the top of the ground’s limestone
layer. After finding a crack in the limestone, Noffsinger broke through this rock as well. Immediately feeling the caverns’ 54 °F (12.2 °C) air, Noffsinger was even more curious. He returned later with an oil lantern and a rope and lowered himself into the ground, making him the first human in the Ohio Caverns.
the tunnels. As they went, the Smith team strung 60-watt light bulbs
from the walls and ceilings to help them see. These lights were powered by a Fordson tractor
on the surface, as the area did not get electricity until the mid-1930s.
Four new exits were dug, one of which contained a horse-drawn wooden freight elevator
. The group mapped approximately 3.5 miles (5.6 km) of tunnel and decided on the best route for a one-way tour. They closed one of the exits permanently with a crude rock wall and planted a tree over it. The elevator also was filled in with rocks, and a concrete wall in the cave now seals it shut. Keeping the style of entrance that Reams had used, iron doors were built at the two ends of the new tour route. A small entrance building was built over one end of the route, and 38 steps descend from the ground floor of the building through the basement and into the cave, 35 feet (10.7 m) below the surface. At the other end, a single flight of 60 concrete stairs was built. Reams' iron door and the current exit door have developed holes large enough for bat
s to enter the cave, and today some little brown bat
s and eastern pipistrelle
s take shelter in the cave, primarily in the winter.
in the pathways they had dug. The Smith family opened their business as the Ohio Caverns in 1925 with a 1 miles (1.6 km) guided tour route that did not include the 0.25 mile (0.402335 km) section that Reams’ early visitors had explored and ravaged.
The rest of the twentieth century brought several changes for the caverns and park. On the surface, two picnic shelters, a dining hall
(which has since been converted to a storage building), a playground
, a restroom building, and a steel barn were built. Later, a small exit building was built to increase security at the exit stairwell, and the entrance building was renovated to now include a gift shop
and a new basement containing offices and storage. In the cave, concrete was hand-laid on the floors in the 1970s. A professional cave lighter, whose team hid the new lights in concrete sconces
in more creative and less obstructive places than the previous bare bulbs, was hired in the 1980s.
that holds excess water out of the walkway. Only about 1 inches (2.5 cm) deep, its name is derived from the reflection
of the ceiling visible in the water. The Crystal Sea is very close to the site of the freight elevator used from 1922 to 1925 and is also close to a mud shelf above the pathway called the Natural Bridge, which holds between 10 and 20 crystal columns and is the original floor of the tunnel. The Smiths’ team left the columns intact during excavation and simply dug under them, forming the Natural Bridge.
Fantasy Land holds more soda straw
s and helictite
s than any other area of the Ohio Caverns. It is called Fantasy Land for the many named formations in the room, one of which being The Old Town Pump, which resembles a hand pump
. The Crystal King is also in Fantasy Land.
in Ohio. At last measurement, the Crystal King was 4 foot long. It is estimated to weigh over 400 pounds (181.4 kg) and be over 200,000 years old. It is also noteworthy that the Crystal King and Fantasy Land are farther from the surface than any other point of the cave. The designated Deepest Point is 103 feet (31.4 m) underground.
once called The Good Luck Crystal, was touched for "good luck" by almost every person who came through the Ohio Caverns for years until the staff noticed the developing brown stain. A no-touching rule has been enforced since, and The Good Luck Crystal has been renamed The Dirty Crystal.
formations; manganese dioxide formations; calcite
formations: stalactites, stalagmites, columns, flowstone
, soda straws, and helictites; and Dual Formations. Dual Formations are extremely rare, and the Ohio Caverns is the only cave in North America and one of very few in the world known to have Dual Formations. A Dual Formation is characterized as being a formation growing on another formation. In the Palace of the Gods, there are calcite stalactites growing on the ends of iron oxide formations.
has been played since 1928.
. Also in the Historic Section are several small crawling areas, including Lovers’ Lane and The Backscratcher, which were explored by Reams and his visitors but not excavated by the Smiths’ team. The Historic Section has very few speleothems because most of them were taken as souvenirs between 1897 and 1922, so its main commercial appeals are its color and graffiti.
Show cave
Show caves — also called tourist caves, public caves, and in the United States, commercial caves — are caves that are managed by a government or commercial organization and made accessible to the general public, usually for an entrance fee...
located 30 miles (48.3 km) from Dayton, Ohio
Dayton, Ohio
Dayton is the 6th largest city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Montgomery County, the fifth most populous county in the state. The population was 141,527 at the 2010 census. The Dayton Metropolitan Statistical Area had a population of 841,502 in the 2010 census...
near West Liberty
West Liberty, Ohio
West Liberty is a village in Logan County, Ohio, United States. The population was 1,813 at the 2000 census.-Geography:West Liberty is located at ....
, in Salem Township, Champaign County, Ohio
Salem Township, Champaign County, Ohio
Salem Township is one of the twelve townships of Champaign County, Ohio, United States. The 2000 census found 2,307 people in the township, 2,296 of whom lived in the unincorporated portions of the township.-Geography:...
in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
. A popular tourist destination and member of the National Caving Association, it is the largest of all the cave systems in Ohio
Ohio
Ohio is a Midwestern state in the United States. The 34th largest state by area in the U.S.,it is the 7th‑most populous with over 11.5 million residents, containing several major American cities and seven metropolitan areas with populations of 500,000 or more.The state's capital is Columbus...
and contains many crystal
Crystal
A crystal or crystalline solid is a solid material whose constituent atoms, molecules, or ions are arranged in an orderly repeating pattern extending in all three spatial dimensions. The scientific study of crystals and crystal formation is known as crystallography...
formations. Approximately 90% of its stalactite
Stalactite
A stalactite , "to drip", and meaning "that which drips") is a type of speleothem that hangs from the ceiling of limestone caves. It is a type of dripstone...
and stalagmite
Stalagmite
A stalagmite is a type of speleothem that rises from the floor of a limestone cave due to the dripping of mineralized solutions and the deposition of calcium carbonate. This stalagmite formation occurs only under certain pH conditions within the underground cavern. The corresponding formation on...
formations are still active. The cavern system was originally an aquifer
Aquifer
An aquifer is a wet underground layer of water-bearing permeable rock or unconsolidated materials from which groundwater can be usefully extracted using a water well. The study of water flow in aquifers and the characterization of aquifers is called hydrogeology...
, holding an underground river of melted glacier water. This river eventually receded to lower levels of the ground and is now unseen.
Formation
The Ohio Caverns are located in the Bellefontaine Outlier, which is an outcropping of DevonianDevonian
The Devonian is a geologic period and system of the Paleozoic Era spanning from the end of the Silurian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya , to the beginning of the Carboniferous Period, about 359.2 ± 2.5 Mya...
-age bedrock surrounded by Silurian
Silurian
The Silurian is a geologic period and system that extends from the end of the Ordovician Period, about 443.7 ± 1.5 Mya , to the beginning of the Devonian Period, about 416.0 ± 2.8 Mya . As with other geologic periods, the rock beds that define the period's start and end are well identified, but the...
-age carbonates. Most recently it has been proposed that in post-Devonian times there was a set of active parallel faults that down-dropped a block of Logan County, forming a graben
Graben
In geology, a graben is a depressed block of land bordered by parallel faults. Graben is German for ditch. Graben is used for both the singular and plural....
, also called a rift valley.
Continued erosion of several glaciers would have been concentrated on areas around the graben, leaving this area without its protective layer of Bedford shale
Bedford Shale
Bedford shale, found in Ohio, varies by its layers, some of which are 350-450 million years old. The shale is successively coursening upward. Fossils are rare in Ohio shale...
and more susceptible to erosion. The sunken graben area then became a topographical high, now the highest point in Ohio at the elevation of 1549 feet above sea level.
Discovery
The tunnel system known today as the Ohio Caverns was discovered August 17, 1897 by Robert Noffsinger, a seventeen-year-old farmhand who worked on the land. After a heavy rain, Noffsinger found a sinkholeSinkhole
A sinkhole, also known as a sink, shake hole, swallow hole, swallet, doline or cenote, is a natural depression or hole in the Earth's surface caused by karst processes — the chemical dissolution of carbonate rocks or suffosion processes for example in sandstone...
in the woods and, curious, decided to investigate. Noffsinger dug a few feet of soil until he hit the top of the ground’s limestone
Limestone
Limestone is a sedimentary rock composed largely of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of calcium carbonate . Many limestones are composed from skeletal fragments of marine organisms such as coral or foraminifera....
layer. After finding a crack in the limestone, Noffsinger broke through this rock as well. Immediately feeling the caverns’ 54 °F (12.2 °C) air, Noffsinger was even more curious. He returned later with an oil lantern and a rope and lowered himself into the ground, making him the first human in the Ohio Caverns.
Mt. Tabor Cave Tours
Noffsinger informed the landowner, a farmer named William Reams, of his discovery. Reams himself explored the cave and then decided to open the cave to the public. Advertised under the name Mt. Tabor Cave Tours, the business brought in hundreds of Ohioans during its 25-year run. These early tourists explored just over 0.25 mile (0.402335 km) of the system but virtually destroyed it by removing crystal formations in that area and writing their names on the walls and ceilings.Excavation
Reams sold the land in 1922 to two brothers, Allen and Ira Smith, who hired an unknown number of workers to help them excavate the rest of the caverns. The team spent three years digging with an array of spades and shovels to remove mud left in the tunnels by the underground river that erodedErosion
Erosion is when materials are removed from the surface and changed into something else. It only works by hydraulic actions and transport of solids in the natural environment, and leads to the deposition of these materials elsewhere...
the tunnels. As they went, the Smith team strung 60-watt light bulbs
Incandescent light bulb
The incandescent light bulb, incandescent lamp or incandescent light globe makes light by heating a metal filament wire to a high temperature until it glows. The hot filament is protected from air by a glass bulb that is filled with inert gas or evacuated. In a halogen lamp, a chemical process...
from the walls and ceilings to help them see. These lights were powered by a Fordson tractor
Fordson tractor
Fordson was a brand name used on a range of mass produced general-purpose tractors manufactured by Henry Ford & Son, Inc, from 1917 until 1920 when it was merged into the Ford Motor Company, which used the name until 1964...
on the surface, as the area did not get electricity until the mid-1930s.
Four new exits were dug, one of which contained a horse-drawn wooden freight elevator
Elevator
An elevator is a type of vertical transport equipment that efficiently moves people or goods between floors of a building, vessel or other structures...
. The group mapped approximately 3.5 miles (5.6 km) of tunnel and decided on the best route for a one-way tour. They closed one of the exits permanently with a crude rock wall and planted a tree over it. The elevator also was filled in with rocks, and a concrete wall in the cave now seals it shut. Keeping the style of entrance that Reams had used, iron doors were built at the two ends of the new tour route. A small entrance building was built over one end of the route, and 38 steps descend from the ground floor of the building through the basement and into the cave, 35 feet (10.7 m) below the surface. At the other end, a single flight of 60 concrete stairs was built. Reams' iron door and the current exit door have developed holes large enough for bat
Bat
Bats are mammals of the order Chiroptera "hand" and pteron "wing") whose forelimbs form webbed wings, making them the only mammals naturally capable of true and sustained flight. By contrast, other mammals said to fly, such as flying squirrels, gliding possums, and colugos, glide rather than fly,...
s to enter the cave, and today some little brown bat
Little brown bat
The little brown bat is a species of the genus Myotis , one of the most common bats of North America...
s and eastern pipistrelle
Eastern Pipistrelle
The Tricolored Bat is a species of bat that is widely distributed throughout the eastern parts of North America, ranging west until Kansas and Texas, from Honduras up north until southern Ontario...
s take shelter in the cave, primarily in the winter.
The Ohio Caverns
The excavation team laid gravelGravel
Gravel is composed of unconsolidated rock fragments that have a general particle size range and include size classes from granule- to boulder-sized fragments. Gravel can be sub-categorized into granule and cobble...
in the pathways they had dug. The Smith family opened their business as the Ohio Caverns in 1925 with a 1 miles (1.6 km) guided tour route that did not include the 0.25 mile (0.402335 km) section that Reams’ early visitors had explored and ravaged.
The rest of the twentieth century brought several changes for the caverns and park. On the surface, two picnic shelters, a dining hall
Cafeteria
A cafeteria is a type of food service location in which there is little or no waiting staff table service, whether a restaurant or within an institution such as a large office building or school; a school dining location is also referred to as a dining hall or canteen...
(which has since been converted to a storage building), a playground
Playground
A playground or play area is a place with a specific design for children be able to play there. It may be indoors but is typically outdoors...
, a restroom building, and a steel barn were built. Later, a small exit building was built to increase security at the exit stairwell, and the entrance building was renovated to now include a gift shop
Gift shop
A gift shop is a store primarily selling souvenirs relating to a particular topic or theme. The items sold often include coffee mugs, stuffed animals, t-shirts, postcards, handmade collections and other souvenirs....
and a new basement containing offices and storage. In the cave, concrete was hand-laid on the floors in the 1970s. A professional cave lighter, whose team hid the new lights in concrete sconces
Sconce (light fixture)
A sconce is a type of light fixture affixed to a wall in such a way that it uses only the wall for support, and the light is usually directed upwards. It does not have a base on the ground...
in more creative and less obstructive places than the previous bare bulbs, was hired in the 1980s.
The Historical Tour
To celebrate the 100 year anniversary of Noffsinger’s discovery of the cave, the Ohio Caverns opened its Historical Tour in 1997. Reams' section of the cave was adorned with the bare bulbs and gravel floors of the early Ohio Caverns tours. The Historical Section was added as a 45-minute extension to the regular tour, and the Historical Tour has been offered as an option ever since.The Crystal Sea and Natural Bridge
The Crystal Sea is an artificial water-retention poolRetention basin
A retention basin is used to manage stormwater runoff to prevent flooding and downstream erosion, and improve water quality in an adjacent river, stream, lake or bay. Sometimes called a wet pond or wet detention basin, it is an artificial lake with vegetation around the perimeter, and includes a...
that holds excess water out of the walkway. Only about 1 inches (2.5 cm) deep, its name is derived from the reflection
Reflection (physics)
Reflection is the change in direction of a wavefront at an interface between two differentmedia so that the wavefront returns into the medium from which it originated. Common examples include the reflection of light, sound and water waves...
of the ceiling visible in the water. The Crystal Sea is very close to the site of the freight elevator used from 1922 to 1925 and is also close to a mud shelf above the pathway called the Natural Bridge, which holds between 10 and 20 crystal columns and is the original floor of the tunnel. The Smiths’ team left the columns intact during excavation and simply dug under them, forming the Natural Bridge.
Fantasy Land and The Old Town Pump
Soda straw
A soda straw is a speleothem in the form of a hollow mineral tube. They grow in places where water leaches slowly through cracks in rock, such as on the roofs of caves...
s and helictite
Helictite
A helictite is a speleothem found in limestone caves that changes its axis from the vertical at one or more stages during its growth. They have a curving or angular form that looks as if they were grown in zero gravity...
s than any other area of the Ohio Caverns. It is called Fantasy Land for the many named formations in the room, one of which being The Old Town Pump, which resembles a hand pump
Hand pump
Hand pumps are manually operated pumps; they use human power and mechanical advantage to move fluids or air from one place to another. They are widely used in every country in the world for a variety of industrial, marine, irrigation and leisure activities...
. The Crystal King is also in Fantasy Land.
The Crystal King and Deepest Point
The Crystal King is the largest free-hanging stalactiteStalactite
A stalactite , "to drip", and meaning "that which drips") is a type of speleothem that hangs from the ceiling of limestone caves. It is a type of dripstone...
in Ohio. At last measurement, the Crystal King was 4 foot long. It is estimated to weigh over 400 pounds (181.4 kg) and be over 200,000 years old. It is also noteworthy that the Crystal King and Fantasy Land are farther from the surface than any other point of the cave. The designated Deepest Point is 103 feet (31.4 m) underground.
The Big Room and The Good Luck Crystal
The Big Room, at more than 0.5 acre (0.202343 ha), is the largest room in the cave and holds hundreds of formations, including the tallest column, which is just over 5 ft (1.5 m) tall, and the newest column, which came together in the 1980s. The next column that will be formed in the caverns is also in The Big Room, and it is estimated to be formed within the next century. During the early days of the Smiths’ tours, touching formations was not prohibited, and there are many formations in the Big Room that are very close to the pathways and have therefore become permanently stained from the dirt and oil in human hands. One such formation, a 5 feet (1.5 m) tall stalagmiteStalagmite
A stalagmite is a type of speleothem that rises from the floor of a limestone cave due to the dripping of mineralized solutions and the deposition of calcium carbonate. This stalagmite formation occurs only under certain pH conditions within the underground cavern. The corresponding formation on...
once called The Good Luck Crystal, was touched for "good luck" by almost every person who came through the Ohio Caverns for years until the staff noticed the developing brown stain. A no-touching rule has been enforced since, and The Good Luck Crystal has been renamed The Dirty Crystal.
The Palace of the Gods and Dual Formations
The Palace of the Gods is the most photographed room in the caverns because of its variety of colors and formations. There are examples of every type of formation in the cave: iron oxideIron oxide
Iron oxides are chemical compounds composed of iron and oxygen. All together, there are sixteen known iron oxides and oxyhydroxides.Iron oxides and oxide-hydroxides are widespread in nature, play an important role in many geological and biological processes, and are widely utilized by humans, e.g.,...
formations; manganese dioxide formations; calcite
Calcite
Calcite is a carbonate mineral and the most stable polymorph of calcium carbonate . The other polymorphs are the minerals aragonite and vaterite. Aragonite will change to calcite at 380-470°C, and vaterite is even less stable.-Properties:...
formations: stalactites, stalagmites, columns, flowstone
Flowstone
Flowstones are composed of sheetlike deposits of calcite formed where water flows down the walls or along the floors of a cave. They are typically found in "solution", or limestone caves, where they are the most common speleothem. However, they may form in any type of cave where water enters that...
, soda straws, and helictites; and Dual Formations. Dual Formations are extremely rare, and the Ohio Caverns is the only cave in North America and one of very few in the world known to have Dual Formations. A Dual Formation is characterized as being a formation growing on another formation. In the Palace of the Gods, there are calcite stalactites growing on the ends of iron oxide formations.
The Jewel Room
The Jewel Room once helped earn Ohio Caverns the nickname "America’s Most Colorful Cavern". Its color is split down the middle of the room so that one side of the room is primarily decorated in iron oxide while the other side is darker from manganese dioxide deposits. The Jewel Room was the last area finished by the Smith team and is therefore the end of the tour. There is an enormous pile in the Jewel Room of rocks from the construction of the exit stairway. At the end of each guided tour, a recording of the song Beautiful OhioBeautiful Ohio
"Beautiful Ohio" is the official song of the U.S. State of Ohio.-History:The first lyrics were written by Ballard MacDonald and the music by Robert A. "Bobo" King, who used the name Mary Earl...
has been played since 1928.
The Historic Section
A tour of the Historic Section, also known as The Old Cave and Reams’ Cave, has been offered since 1997 as an extension of the regular tour. Unlike the concrete floors and hidden-sconce lights in the rest of the cave, there are bare light bulbs and gravel floors similar to the early years of Ohio Caverns tours. Attractions in the Historic Section include The Palace of Natural Art, a colorful natural rotunda; The Giant’s Coffin, a rock nicknamed so by Reams’ early tourists; and The Pulpit, which crudely resembles a church setting and even has an upright-standing rock that resembles a pulpitPulpit
Pulpit is a speakers' stand in a church. In many Christian churches, there are two speakers' stands at the front of the church. Typically, the one on the left is called the pulpit...
. Also in the Historic Section are several small crawling areas, including Lovers’ Lane and The Backscratcher, which were explored by Reams and his visitors but not excavated by the Smiths’ team. The Historic Section has very few speleothems because most of them were taken as souvenirs between 1897 and 1922, so its main commercial appeals are its color and graffiti.