"Brown Hole" in Hardin Couty Illinois?

[Parker Midifly]

"Brown Hole" in Hardin Couty Illinois?

A buddy told be about a very deep hole in the ground in Southern Illinois,
in Hardin County and more specifically in Elizabethtown. The hole is
supposed to be fenced off by the military. He said allong the sides of the
shaft are chambers almost like giant larva chambers or something. He also
said one could throw a rock down the hole and never hear it hit bottom.

I'm seeking information on it just out of curiosity, and my curiosity is
even greater now since I can find absolutley no menion of it on the web
after hours and days of searching. Is there that tight of a lid on it???

My buddy is an outdoorsman type of guy and is very credible. This is not a
joke or prank. Has anybody ever heard of such? Thanks much.

[Jo Schaper]

Lots of abandoned mines in Hardin County. Usually old fluorite mines.

Have no clue what a larval chamber is.

[Parker Midifly]

Jo Schaper <jospamnotschaper34@5socket78dot9net> wrote in
news:12pjbtg...@corp.supernews.com:

> Have no clue what a larval chamber is.

Ever opened up a mud-dobber's nest and seen the little "tunnels" that the
eggs were put into? Rather than eggs it's 'larva' of course.

That's the only way I know how to describe it. The implication made to me
when the description of the place was given was that something may have
incubated there.

Myself, I don't believe that part of it....although I would necessarily
discount natural or unnatural chambers for other purposes. Who knows, if it
actually exists, it could be the hatch-site of some prehistoric
pterodactyl-like animal. ??

[Aidan Karley]

In article <hEjmh.1641$ji1....@newssvr12.news.prodigy.net>, Parker Midifly
wrote:

> > Have no clue what a larval chamber is.
>
> Ever opened up a mud-dobber's nest and seen the little "tunnels" that the
> eggs were put into? Rather than eggs it's 'larva' of course.
>

No idea what a mud dobber is, but it's quite common for miners to put
side tunnels out to both sides of a vertical shaft for efficiently
exploiting a resource. The purpose of a mine is, of course, to get lumps of
whatever your valued substance is, out of the ground and off to whoever is
paying for them.

> Who knows, if it
> actually exists, it could be the hatch-site of some prehistoric
> pterodactyl-like animal. ??
>

Pterodctyls had very lightly-built limbs and bodies which would not
be well suited to the rigours of excavating tunnels in solid rock. Much more
likely the traces of what we call "T'owd man" over here - mines that predate
legislation about registering mineral claims, excavations etc.

--
Aidan Karley, FGS
Aberdeen, Scotland
Written at Fri, 05 Jan 2007 09:05 GMT, but posted later.

[Jo Schaper]

Aidan Karley wrote:
> In article <hEjmh.1641$ji1....@newssvr12.news.prodigy.net>, Parker Midifly
> wrote:
>>> Have no clue what a larval chamber is.
>> Ever opened up a mud-dobber's nest and seen the little "tunnels" that the
>> eggs were put into? Rather than eggs it's 'larva' of course.

A mud dauber is a wasp/hornet which builds its home out of mud, instead
of the thin paper-like structures which most wasps make. I cannot give
you a genus and species--I never hung around closely enough to look.

There is all sort of really nice crystalline fluorite (blue, purple,
yellow, clear and green) out of Hardin Co., Illinois. They had a
toothpaste mine there (tongue in cheek, but they really did mine food
grade fluorite there to be converted to sodium fluoride.)