The Photography of Kurt F Fink (kfink.portfolio.com)

Up until the late 1920’s, local farmers would come by the exposed limestone rocks at the base of the portion of Raccoon Mountain known as Mount Aetna. There they would sit and relax on hot afternoons as they enjoyed the cool air which would blow out of the cracks in the limestone rocks. Finally, in late 1929, they invited Leo Lambert, a famed local caver who discovered Ruby Falls the year before, to explore the area for a cave. After crawling through a small opening in a horizontal crack, Mr. Lambert found a pristine cave which appealed to his love of caves. He decided to open it as a tourist attraction and spent the next several years working on trails around the Crystal Palace Room. He named this beautiful cave “Tennessee Caverns” and opened it to the public on June 28, 1931. The original tour, now known as the Lambert Tour, circled the Crystal Palace Room which was, at that time, the largest room in the cave. Some twenty years after its opening, the Smith Brothers were ma...

  Fort Ligonier  is a British  fortification  from the  Fre nch a nd Indian War  located in  Ligonier ,  Pennsylvania ,  United States . The fort served as a staging area for the  Forbes Expedition  of 1758. During the eight years of its existence as a garrison, Fort Ligonier was never taken by an enemy. It served as a post of passage to the new  Fort Pitt , and during  Pontiac's War  of 1763, was a vital link in the British communication and supply lines. It was attacked twice and besieged by the Native Americans, prior to the decisive victory at  Bushy Run  in August of that year. The fort was decommissioned from active service in 1766. Today, there is a  museum  next to the reconstructed fort. Inside the museum there are artifacts from the battle. An individual can take a guided tour of the fort, and on Fort Ligonier Days, the fort's cannons are fired. The Prussians   On Novem...