Three Caves Tour

photos by CDaniels

Three Caves is not a cave at all, but a limestone mine once known as Three Caves Limestone Quarry.  It was once leased by the Madison Limestone Co. from Madison County and was operating from 1945 until 1952.  Its location in the center of Huntsville at the base of Monte Sano Mountain made it impractical to continue operation.  The cost of mining operations and the protesting neighborhoods due to the noise closed the mine for good.  Open pit mining was more efficient, and a mining operation in the middle of a very fast-growing town was unsafe.  Madison County designated Three Caves as a fallout shelter during the Cuban Missile Crisis in the 1960's.  But the plans to stock the caves with food never materialized since the Cuban Crisis was averted.  These man-made set of caves is maintained by The Land Trust of Huntsville & North Alabama since 1989 when the County donated Three Caves to the Land Trust.
 
 

• To provide a sharp contrast for natural caves such as Shelta Cave and Cathedral Caverns,  teachers will be able to walk through and observe this man-made cave.  A guided tour of the quarry will be provided by me as a member of the Land Trust of Huntsville.
• The teachers will examine the features that are now naturally forming and determine the new residents of the cave.  Bats, birds, spiders and insects are now regularly found there.
• They will reexamine the type of limestone formation the quarry was in.

As the tour begins, visitors are asked to observe but not touch the newly forming cave pearls and other cave structures in the cave.

The teachers will be able to observe the opening as definitely square and obviously man-made in contrast to an opening cut by a stream dissolving through limestone.

 

• Teachers should be able to note the following:  Mixed with ragged cuts along its walls and ceilings carved by dynamite blasts in the 1940's and 50's are the beginnings of  natural stalagmites and flow stones, cave pearls and other natural cave formations.  There are several areas along the walls cut by underground streams.

• The process of dissolution of limestone and precipitation of calcite deposits are evident in many spots.  There are areas where water from above has seeped down underground cutting holes in the ceiling and walls of the quarry.  The averate temperature here is 53 to 58 degrees year round.

• Teachers should be able to observe that the limestone found here were deposited while the area were enundated by seas.  The rocks here are part of the Tuscumbia Limestone Formation which lies comformably over the Fort Payne Chert.

• It has been proposed that there has been a natural cave in the Three Caves Quarry before it was mined.  There are three openings into the caves and one may have been the natural entrance to a cave.

Return to Daily Itinerary

Home