File:Mid-1800s graffiti (Main Cave, Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA) 1 (38201560862).jpg

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Western Kentucky's Mammoth Cave is the longest cave system on Earth, with 412 miles known and mapped as of fall 2017. The name does not refer to the early discovery of fossil mastodon or mammoth bones here. Rather, the name refers to the immense size of many rooms and passages.

Shown here is historical graffiti (= vandalism) in the Main Cave, the principal trunk passage in the Mammoth Cave Ridge part of the system. The rocks are gray, marine limestones of the upper Ste. Genevieve Limestone (upper Middle Mississippian).

Written on the wall is the name "Sable Melodists". The story behind this group has only recently been elucidated. The graffiti was possibly done using graphite or charcoal from burnt cork. "Sable Melodists" was a blackface minstrel group in the mid-1800s. The markings here in Mammoth Cave are undated, but were probably made in 1848 or 1849 (see Smith, 2013 for the detailed story).

Locality: southwestern wall of Main Cave, between the tuberculosis huts & Star Chamber, Mammoth Cave Ridge, Mammoth Cave National Park, western Kentucky, USA

Reference cited:

Smith, J.B. 2013. Sable Melodists. Mammoth Cave National Park's 10th Research Symposium: Celebrating the Diversity of Research in the Mammoth Cave Region, pp. 134-138. (To see the online version of this article, click on "Download" near the bottom of this page: <a href="http://digitalcommons.wku.edu/mc_reserch_symp/10th_Research_Symposium_2013/Research_Posters/17/" rel="noreferrer nofollow">digitalcommons.wku.edu/mc_reserch_symp/10th_Research_Symp...</a>)
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Source Mid-1800s graffiti (Main Cave, Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, USA) 1
Author James St. John

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This image was originally posted to Flickr by James St. John at https://flickr.com/photos/47445767@N05/38201560862 (archive). It was reviewed on 13 October 2019 by FlickreviewR 2 and was confirmed to be licensed under the terms of the cc-by-2.0.

13 October 2019

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current17:40, 13 October 2019Thumbnail for version as of 17:40, 13 October 20194,000 × 3,000 (9.09 MB)Ser Amantio di Nicolao (talk | contribs)Transferred from Flickr via #flickr2commons

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