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LEWISBURG -- Caves are supposed to contain wonders and, like its fabled counterparts, Organ Cave in Greenbrier County lives up to that. The wonders found there are more historical than financial, however.
After being closed for several years, Organ cave reopened in April 1998 with new owners. Sam and Jane Morgan bought the cave property in an auction in September 1997.
They started work cleaning up the cave and preparing it for visitors in November 1998.
Although they took out a loan for $616,500 and did a lot of work in the cave, adding new lights and railings to the pathway, they did not and will not alter any of the natural or historic features of the cave, Jane Morgan said.
The Morgans believe they have in Organ Cave an attraction that will bring in people year-round, so the cave, for the first time, is being kept open during the winter. In terms of both natural and historical interest, the cave offers much to visitors, including the fact that it is one of the largest caves in the world.
"We are the 17th longest cave in the world," Morgan said. "We're also the fifth largest cave in the United States, the third largest commercial cave in the United States."
Much of the history of Organ Cave is connected to saltpeter, which was found in abundance in the cave. Morgan said the saltpeter mined there primarily was used to make gunpowder. Because of the saltpeter, the cave has connections to a significant portion of American history.
"Thomas Jefferson used the cave in the latter part of the 1700s to mine it for the saltpeter, and it was used in the War of 1812 and then the Civil War, all for saltpeter," Morgan said.
"It's (the cave) got two beds of saltpeter that have already been mined, cultivated, but one bed of saltpeter's never...