Show THE DAIE OF 1810 IND THE CIA OWE E AT ANTELOPE SPRINGS the date is 1840 pecked in the rock wall of the lower or shelter cave opening it bears all eNi evidence dence that it was inas enado by taking a sharp miners pick and following a charcoal outlines previously drawn in the stub of a burned match or other means of making a line then picking followed until 1840 cut on the rock but deplorably a enrollee a year or so ago tried to change the 4 in to a 6 and now the date plainly the 6 over the 4 it wlas reported to me about 12 to 14 years ago but the date given then was 1842 by my ln informant formant quoting from a faulty memory that man mail said the date bore a word along with it reading 1842 mormon I 1 took no credence in it then a few years ago a sheepherder set fire to all the pack rat nest twigs grass etc etc which the pack rats always so laboriously lug into such places he said it burned two days but there were no indian relics relies in it nothing but stone imp ample e ments would survive such treatment anyway so if ever there were true indian artifacts in the first or shelter opening of a perishable nature they were burned in that fire the walls of the shelter show plain evidences of fire being much smoked it would be interesting to know if in that region there Is another date an 1842 with or without the word mormon close to it further hunting would disclose suh a thing if it exists As I 1 remembered what the sheepherder told me his date of 1842 was over the divide on the death canyon side but I 1 can not be positive as many years have elapsed several small figures of men in red paint one in fair preservation are on the walls of this shelter one is the asua usua usual 1 katazina kat zina boim wedge body legs akimbo if one may say so or with legs outwardly bent from the hips and dropping down on the outside of the body form not merely an extension of the body lines one may once hive shown a feather in hair but that is conjectural as it is very near the critical age and dim one or two are nearly gone but they are genuine and good examples of red painted indian work now sum up that far smoke stained walls the smoke stain done at the time the indians sought shelter in it oi 01 done by the sheepherder who burned the pack rat nest it is impossible to say either may have stained tae tle walls but from the indian red painted men and genuine the indians used it that far we can get w without vit hout difficulty As to the date 1840 1 I am not at all impressed by it I 1 don t think it was cut in 1840 some passerby many years later may have cut it it doesn doean t look old and no one in 1840 was passing through this region trappers would have held to streams so far I 1 am not at all impressed with 1840 to set the reader light this is not the cave propel it is a small shallow shelter cave below the orifice to the cave proper which is probably forty feet further up the hill leaving this place go up the hill something like forty feet and an opening about the size of a big barrel 4 ft in diameter shows the opening is funnel shaped larger as it goes on down dropping about 20 ft then there is room for six to eight persons to stand without crowding very steep and requiring a rope to get down that far then the cave goes up but not so steeply again requiring a rope then begin the passages it is a fissure cave narrow not opening out into large capacious rooms with flat ceiling but in all aspects a cave largely following a fissure probably caused by a fault a long time ago geologically narrow sides fairly parallel five to eight feet apart with many pits side shoots or other openings going off and down there is one large stalactite about fourteen inches in diameter of which we took a flash light picture but in many cases the boys had kicked and broken out whole clus aclus of stalactites the stubs hanging down and the floor space below litera llly strewed with broken fragments too bad near the front is a nice lime dome blue in color up rather high just like being in a capitol and looking up at the dome say 8 feet in diameter A chinaman stalagmite stand ing on a frosted cake chink and all about 22 in high two or three nice little cascades some rope effect none hollow that we could find A place where the visitor goes belly buster blister and is glad he ate a light breakfast two places where it is dangerous our guide mr R L mcleod of the camp had on keds canvas shoes with thick corrugated rubber soles and he went like a fly avei places where kelly with big boots and I 1 in leather soled oxfords had a hell of a time to follow and scared seared stiff every muscle in my body aches as I 1 write this two days later and I 1 am stiff and sore from the unusual hard exertion we could not have made the trip if we had not had a guide agile and familiar with the cave mr kelly and I 1 wish to thank lieutenants coffin and warren for an invitation to visit the cave and especially their kindness in arranging for mr air mcleod lo 10 guide us through now as to stories of the cave first of it came to me about twelve of fifteen years ago but very fanciful one dandy story was that the indians carried parried their dead up to the orifice and tossed them in for burial and that at the bottom was a huge pile of bones and skulls too bad to spoil such a glamorous tale another story is that the cave had pits in it in which when one drops a rock you can hear it bounding down and DOWN and yet D DOWN 0 W N twixt and sunset not to be outdone mcleod beat that his flash light got bumped out of his hand and we heard it drop and drop and crash on and on downward until I 1 heard a jap holler BANZAI just th ticket for a night sortie some pit however old or oft express sed T is his at last who says it best I 1 hope that will hold down a few bottomless pit stories though when I 1 was precariously balanced over one of those pits scared seared stiff about as much use as a dish rag I 1 was wailing to believe any story whatever and even conjectured how it if I 1 fell the japs and chinks would be put to rout by having a bespectacled chin whisker pop up in no mans land pencil in hand taking down notes that s the only reason I 1 hung on with eyebrows and toe nails not to scare the belligerents always thoughtful that way ay if the cave is to be made accessible for tourists much work will have to be done on it safety guide rails solidly fixed into the rock walls and a great deal of further done owing to its fissure like characteristic narrowness and lack of big open and large rooms it may not appeal to tourists it would be very nice for the boys there to explore it more and more find big rooms if possible and block out the best route ava laible to get to them and above all not to break any hanging stalactite and may I 1 suggest that the boys try to find a cave in death canyon and report their findings 9 |