By JENNIFER MOONSONG
Glasgow News 1
Stephen Bishop came to Mammoth Cave, Kentucky in 1838, an enslaved man. He, his family and his legacy will forever be closely intertwined with the history of Mammoth Cave National Park.
At the time, the cave was not established fully as a tourist attraction, but certainly gained the attention of tourists and academically minded ones who wanted to understand the particulars of what later came to be known as the world’s longest cave system. He eloquently and accurately described it as a “grand, gloomy and peculiar place.”
An etching of Stephen Bishop, who was one of Mammoth Cave’s earliest and most skilled guides, known for having recorded the early events f the cave, having mapped it.
SUBMITTED
Bishop quickly became a cave guide. He was the one at the helm of the exploration and excavation of new passages through the cave. This was during the time the cave was owned by the affluent Franklin Gorin, who recorded bits and pieces of Bishop’s life and duties in his writings. He was described by Gorin as a “self-educated man … He had a fine genius, a great fund of wit and humor, some little knowledge of Latin and Greek, and much knowledge of geology, but his great talent was his knowledge of man…His talents were of the first order. He was trustworthy and reliable; he was companionable; he was a hero and he could be a clown. He knew a gentleman or a lady as if by instinct. He learned whatever he wished to learn without trouble or labor, and professors of geology spoke highly of his knowledge in that department of science.”
Bishop was present for many new discoveries that were made at Mammoth Cave, even being responsible for mapping a good portion of the cave. The map was published in Rambles in the Mammoth Cave During the Year 1844, by a Visitor.
Bishop and his wife Charlotte had one son. Bishop eventually gained his freedom and began working at Mammoth Cave as a paid employee. The Bishop family moved to a piece of land near the cave property. By the end of the summer of 1857, though, Bishop died from causes unknown. Bishop has a stone in is honor in The Old Guide’s Cemetery. The site can be visited today in Mammoth Cave National Park.
The information for this article was derived from articles presented by the National Park Service.
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