Discovering Wind Cave
The many books in the Images of America Series offer readers the opportunity to get to revisit the histories of places they know well. Thus, I have enjoyed reading several volumes in the series which describe Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where I was born, or Washington, D.C., where I live. But the many volumes in the series can also be used to discover something about new places - towns or sites in the United States that the reader finds unfamiliar. For me, this book on Wind Cave National Park falls into the latter category. I have never been to Wind Cave and knew nothing of it before reading this book. The book taught me something of a place and its people that are outside my usual run of things.
Wind Cave National Park is located in southwest South Dakota south of Mount Rushmore, about 50 miles south of Rapid City and 6 miles north of Hot Springs. In 1903, the cave became the seventh National Park in the United States and the first devoted to a cave. Wind Cave is one of the longest caves in the world, and its full extent has even today not been determined. The cave has many unusual features including a rare cave formation called boxwork. Over 600,000 people visited the Wind Cave National Park in 2007.
In 1912 Congress made the Wind Cave National Park a wildlife refuge. Shortly thereafter, the New York Zoo donated 14 bison to the Park, and other donors transferred elk and antelope. Today the Park is a thriving sanctuary for wildlife, including about 350 buffalo.
In her book, Peggy Sanders tells in photographs and text the story of Wind Cave National Park over its first 100 years. Sanders, from Oral South Dakota, is the wife of a rancher. She has lived in the region of the cave all her life and has written five books on southwest South Dakota for Images of America. In 2007, Sanders received first place in the Will Rogers Writing Contest sponsored by the National Society of Newspaper Columnists for an essay she had written. She is an ideal person to write a homespun history such as this book about Wind Cave. A bit more proofing and editing from Arcadia would have been welcome.
In six short chapters of photos and text, Sanders gives an overview of the history of Wind Cave and of the key moments in its development. Although it had been known to Indians, a young man named Tom Bingham became in 1881 the first settler to discover the Cave. A few years later, a teenager named Alvin McDonald fell in love with the cave and spent much time in its exploration. McDonald left a diary of his effort and the diary is on display at the Park. The Cave was made a Park in 1903 partially to avoid a feud over ownership that had developed between two rival claimants.
During the long years of the Depression, the Civilian Conservation Corps made many contributions to Wind Cave National Park. The CCC constructed an elevator to the Cave and built park buildings, including the Visitors Center. The CCC brought improved lighting to the cave and constructed roads and trails in the Park, among many other accomplishments. Sanders devotes a great deal of space to documenting the efforts of the CCC. Her book also documents the extensive Indian presence at Wind Cave and tells a great deal about the NPS employees who devoted their careers to the Park. She also offers many scenes of local people and areas surrounding the Park.
I enjoyed the opportunity of learning from this book about a place that was new to me. This book will have its greatest appeal to those readers familiar with the area and to those who have visited Wind Cave or who have a special interest in caves.
