When the Light Fell All Around Him

Lewis and Clark Caverns are located within the rugged limestone shoulders and elbows of the mountains above the Jefferson River in what is known as “Gold West Country” in Montana.  The caverns fill the inside of the mountains like intestines and stomachs inside a cow.  The caves are teeming with unearthly formations.

Access to the caverns (for tourists) was initially fashioned by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) during the Great Depression.  President Franklin D. Roosevelt created the CCC as part of the New Deal.  The CCC was a broad-based work relief program that provided manual labor jobs on conservation projects or projects to develop natural resources for public access.  In 1941, the caverns became Montana’s first State Park.

Somewhere at about the time the caverns were being developed by the Conservation Corps, a man ventured inside the caves all alone.  Deep inside the mountain, his lantern failed.

There is something to be said for light.  Sunflowers certainly enjoy it.  Light makes removing a sliver from your palm with a needle a far more pleasurable experience than possible without light.  The Mona Lisa is better in light.  And—while all creatures are clearly able adapt to blindness, which is a kind of darkness by default—suddenly being plunged into total darkness is another sort of beast entirely.

The man in the cave went a little berserk at first.  For a while he groped and shuffled and felt his way about the formations, utterly panicked, but mindful of the holes and cliffs inside the mountains.  He yelled out.  He listened to the water slowly dripping into formations.  He imagined ten-thousand years forming an inch of new stone.  He imagined arms reaching for him in the black.  Voices.

Nearly three days after the man’s lantern went black; men came at him with light dancing all around them.  At first the light hurt his eyes and seemed to be running in circles.  But he was excited about the light and the thought of going home.  And he was so very happy to be standing there when the light fell all around him. 

He did not realize for several minutes that he was not actually standing there…but was, in fact, lying on his back.

Photo: Trademark Electic

--Mitchell Hegman

A quick cavern tour:   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YABvdloUdqc