Old Man's Cave

At a glance

Overview

Old Man's Cave is a large recess cave in the gorge of a small stream, informally called Old Man's Creek, in Benton Township of southwestern Hocking County; the gorge drops more than 100 feet in just over half a mile through the full thickness of the Black Hand Sandstone. The cave takes its name from a recluse named Richard Rowe, though the sources disagree on when he lived there and where he came from. The rock shelters and gorges were local picnic grounds through the 19th century and well-known scenic attractions by 1870. In 1924 the State of Ohio bought 146 acres around the cave under the 1915 State Forest Law, its first purchase in what became Hocking Hills State Park; the other sites followed later in the 1920s. New Deal work programs, among them the Civilian Conservation Corps and the Works Progress Administration, built trails, stone bridges and stairs in the 1930s, the new Ohio Department of Natural Resources took over the park in 1949, and Old Man's Cave remains its most visited area.

The name

Named for the 'old man' Richard Rowe, a recluse said to have lived in the main recess cave and to be buried beneath its ledge. The versions differ: the Hocking Hills tourism site says Rowe's family came to the Ohio Valley about 1796 from the Cumberland Mountains of Tennessee; Ohio Memory calls him a 19th-century hermit from Tennessee; the state marker says he made the cave his home in the 1800s; the 1975 Ohio Geological Survey guidebook says he was a fugitive from West Virginia who lived there after the Civil War. The stream itself has no formal name and has long been called Old Man's Creek informally. (source)

How the land formed

The gorge is cut into the Black Hand Sandstone, the upper member of the Cuyahoga Formation, laid down about 345 million years ago in the Mississippian Period as a delta built into a shallow sea from the southeast. The Black Hand has three zones: a hard lower zone about 100 feet thick, a weakly cemented crossbedded middle zone about 40 feet thick, and a hard upper zone up to 40 feet thick. Old Man's Creek falls about 30 feet over the upper zone at the Upper Falls, scours the pothole called the Devil's Bathtub, and drops again at the Lower Falls over the lower zone; the cave itself, about 200 feet long, 50 feet high and 75 feet deep, is hollowed from the soft middle zone, with the hard upper zone as its roof and a joint parallel to the valley as its edge. Enlargement comes mostly from sand grains spalling off one at a time. Glacial ice came within about 6 miles of the park but never reached it; the gorges were cut by running water, whose volume the nearby ice sheets probably increased greatly. The towering hemlocks in the gorge are glacial relicts, and the small plant Sullivantia sullivantii has survived on its cool, moist walls since preglacial times. (source)

Native American history

No archaeological site is recorded at Old Man's Cave itself in published sources. The 1975 state geology guidebook says Paleo-Indian fluted points are found in nearby eastern Ross County but none in the park areas, that Adena burial mounds occur in the region (one prominent mound on the Salt Creek floodplain), and that the evidence suggests no permanent habitation of the rock shelters, which probably served as temporary seasonal shelter for hunting parties. The Ohio Department of Natural Resources says the Wyandot, Delaware and Shawnee traveled through or lived in the area in the mid-1700s, and that people first used the recesses more than 7,000 years ago. The Queer Creek valley below the cave was an Indian route toward the Shawnee town of Chillicothe on the Scioto; the 1883 county history says the Wyandot held this tract and used the Queer Creek valley as a place of refuge. The river name Hockhocking is given as Delaware (Lenape) for 'bottle' by Wikipedia's county-history source, and as Wyandot by the state historical marker. White settlement followed the Treaty of Greenville in 1795.

• Queer Creek - Salt Creek route to Chillicothe: trail, Queer Creek valley below Old Man's Cave, toward the Scioto River, 18th century (frontier wars)
• Adena mound on the Salt Creek floodplain: mound, Salt Creek valley west of the park, Early Woodland (Adena)
• Treaty of Greenville cession: treaty, Hocking County region, 1795

Stories

The old man in the cave (legend and its versions)

The story, as told by the Hocking Hills tourism site: Richard Rowe's family came to the Ohio Valley about 1796 from the Cumberland Mountains of Tennessee to set up a trading post, and Rowe traveled the Scioto with his two dogs hunting game until a side trip up Salt Creek brought him to the Hocking gorges. He lived out his life in the large recess cave and is buried beneath its ledge. The same account says earlier residents were two brothers, Nathaniel and Pat Rayon, who came in 1795, built a cabin 30 feet north of the cave and are buried in or near it; their cabin was later taken down and moved to the nearby Iles farm as a tobacco drying house. The 1975 state geology guidebook tells it differently: Rowe was a fugitive from West Virginia who lived there as a recluse after the Civil War and was reputedly buried beneath the rocks on the cave floor. The state historical marker at the cave splits the difference, saying only that Rowe made the cave his home in the 1800s. None of these sources cites a document for Rowe's life, so the dates remain tradition. (source)

'This is the road to hell, 1782'

Samuel P. Hildreth, who was on Ohio's first geological survey in 1837, wrote that one of the Indians' favorite descents ran down Queer Creek, a tributary of Salt Creek, opening a direct course to their town of old Chillicothe. Near the outlet of the narrow valley, he wrote, there had stood a few years earlier a large beech carved in legible letters: 'This is the road to hell, 1782.' Hildreth took it to be the work of some unfortunate prisoner on his way to the old Indian town. Henry Howe reprinted the account in his Historical Collections of Ohio, and the 1883 History of Hocking Valley repeated it nearly word for word. The 1975 state guidebook places the tree near South Bloomingville and suggests the captive had, at least for a time, made good his escape. (source)

How a state forest became a state park

Through the 19th century the rock shelters and gorges were hiking and picnicking grounds for local people, and the many names and dates carved into the rock before 1900 bear witness to it. The ruggedness of the gorges kept loggers out of the virgin timber until the early 1900s, when lumbering operations became a threat. The state forest law of 1915 provided for buying sites of scenic value, and in 1924 Ohio bought the first tract, which took in Old Man's Cave; the other park sites were bought later in the 1920s. In the 1930s federal relief programs, among them the Works Progress Administration, built stone bridges, stairs, tunnels and trails into the gorges and replanted the worn-out uplands. By 1975, the state geologist Michael Hansen wrote, that planting and the regrowth of forest on long-abandoned farms had returned the region to something close to its original character; a modern lodge and cabins had opened in the park in 1972. (source)

The CCC companies that built the trails

In the 1930s the Civilian Conservation Corps put young unemployed men to work in the Hocking Hills. Company 505, based at Camp Hocking and one of the first CCC camps organized in Ohio, worked on trails at Tar Hollow, Ash Cave, Old Man's Cave and Rock House, and built bridges, walls, shelter houses, parking areas and picnic grounds. The roster usually numbered about 200 men living in military-style barracks, and most of their pay was sent home to their families. Enrollees built the camp's administrative cabin from American chestnut, a timber then plentiful because blight was killing the species, with a chimney of local stone; the cabin still stands in Hocking State Forest. The camps closed as the country entered World War II, the last Ohio camps in 1942. (source)

Grandma Gatewood's winter hike

Emma Gatewood of Gallia County became famous in 1955 as the first woman to hike the entire Appalachian Trail alone, at age 67. Beginning in January 1967 she led a six-mile hike each winter through Hocking Hills State Park. When she led it for the last time in 1973, more than 2,500 hikers came; she died that June at 85. In January 1981 the six-mile stretch from Old Man's Cave to Cedar Falls and Ash Cave was designated the Grandma Gatewood Memorial Trail, and it now carries the Buckeye Trail, the North Country Trail and the American Discovery Trail through the park. The annual winter hike kept growing, drawing more than 4,000 people in 2013. (source)

Timeline

• c. 345 million years ago: The Black Hand Sandstone, in which the gorge and cave are carved, is laid down as a delta in a shallow Mississippian sea. (source)
• 1782: A beech near the outlet of the Queer Creek valley is carved 'This is the road to hell, 1782,' probably by a prisoner being taken to the old Indian town of Chillicothe. (source)
• 1795: The Treaty of Greenville opens the region to settlers, who move in over the following years. (source)
• 1795: According to the Hocking Hills tourism site, brothers Nathaniel and Pat Rayon arrive and build a cabin 30 feet north of the cave entrance. (source)
• c. 1796: According to the Hocking Hills tourism site, Richard Rowe's family moves to the Ohio Valley from the Cumberland Mountains of Tennessee; Rowe later settles in the cave (a 1975 state source instead places him there after the Civil War). (source)
• 1818: Hocking County is organized. (source)
• 1837: Dr. Samuel P. Hildreth of the first geological survey of Ohio visits and describes the Queer Creek gorges, first bringing the scenery to general notice in Silliman's Journal. (source)
• 1870: By this year the Hocking cave areas are well known as scenic attractions. (source)
• 1915: Ohio passes the State Forest Law through the efforts of State Forester Edmund Secrest; a later amendment lets the state buy sites of scenic value. (source)
• 1924: The State of Ohio makes its first land purchase in the Hocking Hills, 146 acres that include Old Man's Cave. (source)
• 1931: Old Man's Cave Forest Park draws 75,765 visitors in the first ten months of the year, the most of the Hocking County parks. (source)
• 1933: Karl Ver Steeg reports Old Man's Cave Park at 1,010 acres and notes that the Ohio Federation of Women's Clubs chose it as the outstanding beauty spot in Ohio. (source)
• 1933: The Civilian Conservation Corps is formed; Company 505 at Camp Hocking, one of the first CCC camps in Ohio, improves trails at Old Man's Cave, Ash Cave, Rock House and Tar Hollow and builds bridges, walls and shelter houses. (source)
• 1934: Company 526, an African American CCC unit, is stationed at Camp Logan near Cantwell Cliffs, where it stays until 1937. (source)
• 1942: With U.S. entry into World War II the CCC disbands, and the last Ohio camps close. (source)
• 1949: The Ohio Department of Natural Resources is created, and its Division of Parks and Recreation takes over the Hocking Hills State Park complex from the Division of Forestry. (source)
• 1967: Emma 'Grandma' Gatewood leads the first of her January hikes through the park. (source)
• 1972: A dining lodge and vacation cabins open in the park (Wikipedia gives 1970 for the first lodge). (source)
• 1973: More than 2,500 hikers turn out for Gatewood's last winter hike; she dies that June. (source)
• 1975: The Ohio Division of Geological Survey publishes Michael C. Hansen's guidebook on the geology of the park region. (source)
• 1981: The six-mile trail from Old Man's Cave to Cedar Falls and Ash Cave is designated the Grandma Gatewood Memorial Trail. (source)
• 2013: The January winter hike draws more than 4,000 people. (source)
• 2016: The park's dining lodge, closed for renovation, burns down in December. (source)
• 2017: Whispering Cave, reached by a new trail and swinging bridge built with volunteers from 2015, opens to the public as a park site. (source)
• 2020: Construction of a new two-story lodge with 81 guest rooms begins on July 1. (source)
• 2022: The new Hocking Hills Lodge and Conference Center opens in the autumn. (source)

Sources

• ohiodnr.gov: GB4 Hansen 1975
• ohiodnr.gov: hocking hills state park
• ohiomemory.ohiohistory.org
• archive.org: historyofhocking00inte djvu.txt
• archive.org: historicalcollec01howe 1 djvu.txt
• kb.osu.edu
• hockinghills.com: old mans cave
• remarkableohio.org: 5 37 old mans cave a feature of ohios geology
• en.wikipedia.org: Hocking Hills State Park
• en.wikipedia.org: Grandma Gatewood
• ohiodnr.gov: camp hocking cabin
• ohiodnr.gov: rock house cavern
• dam.assets.ohio.gov: hocking
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Lower Old Man's Cave DPLA 4d61d9994c54ae8808fc5890a73def34 (page 1).jpg
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Old Man, Old Man's Cave, near Lancaster, Logan, and Nelsonville, Ohio DPLA 9beb8fb
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Hocking Hills Lodge Logan, Ohio DPLA 9eca07138eeddf37f8d21d24ed5edf18 (page 1).jpg
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Old Man's Cave Upper Falls (11885961465).jpg
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Devil's Bathtub (Old Man's Cave Gorge, Hocking Hills, Ohio, USA) 1 (34837431586).j
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Rock shelter (recess cave) (Old Man's Cave, Hocking Hills, Ohio, USA) 1.jpg
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Old Man's Cave (23085).jpg
• commons.wikimedia.org: File:Hocking Hills State Park, July 2024 001.jpg