Dan Crowl

I find it difficult to believe that Joe is gone. Even with the cancer, his operation, his chemotreatments, and everything else, I still struggle accepting this loss. He has always been a force to contend with in central Kentucky caving. I talked to him last on the phone at the Fisher Ridge Reunion last May – I now feel sad that I didn't reach out to him since then, although the thought did cross my mind in recent months.

I first met Joe in Crumps Cave in the early 1970s. He was always the guy doing the crazy cave trips that mere mortals had trouble comprehending. He did the extra long trips. He did the trips with hardly any food. He did the trips under very adverse conditions.

My first trip with him was to a dig at the bottom of Connection Pit in Crumps. The dig was directly below an upper passage that went - the theory being that the lower passage was just a mudded up version of the upper passage. Connection pit is not very far from the Crumps entrance – perhaps an hour or so. We arrived at the dig in due time with several other cavers in tow and started the dig. I had no comprehension of a Joe Saunders' dig at that time. After several hours of digging I had had enough - it appeared that Joe had just begun and he seem annoyed that I wanted to leave. Eventually another group came down the rope at the pit drop on their way out and I joined them. Joe and the remaining diggers came out in the middle of the night – quite a long time later. The next morning I was to hear a report on the dig from Joe that I was to hear many times in the future: “We made a lot of progress but didn't break through into anything, perhaps next time.” He seemed just as excited about the future prospects from this dig as ever, although I don't think he ever went back to this particular dig.

Eventually Crumps had a big breakout when entry was gained into Crump Avenue. Crump Avenue turned out to be a mostly walking passage that traversed almost the entire length of the cave system. For Crumps, any passage that is walking is a major discovery and Crump Avenue was undoubtedly the biggest. The discovery was made by Tom Ramsey and Doug Welker by pushing a 1000+ foot belly whomp appropriately named Laceration Lane. The passage was almost entirely a belly whomp, with half of the passage being a crawl over chert with the remaining passage being a very low crawl in sand. Oh, I forgot to mention the Whimper Route – a low several hundred foot belly crawl in several inches of water just prior to Laceration Lane. Oh, I forgot to mention the Sand Crawl, Connection Crawl, Thin Man's Misery, and a few other features that gave Crumps its robust character. Joe excelled with this type of stuff and quickly rose to the demands of the cave, invoking 24 to 30 hour trips into the cave to further the Crump Avenue exploration and survey.

Eventually a base camp was established in the cave. In those days I was living in Champaign, Illinois and started base camp trips with some Illinois cavers. On one particular trip, another Illinois caver and myself broke into a nice walking passage on a side lead off of Crump Avenue. The discovery was made towards the end of our base camp trip. We left the cave with only a short run down the passage and reported the results back to Joe. He returned the following week with someone else and scooped a major piece of passage from us. Oh well!

Eventually I moved to New York city area and Joe moved to Lexington, KY. I did a fair amount of travel for the paper company I worked for and made arrangements to stop off in Lexington on my way to a business trip in Mississippi. Joe and I did a base camp trip into Crumps, moping up some leads that appeared to be heading towards the truck stop on the interstate. After some survey and very optimistic digging the passage terminated in a blank wall with a mud hole – not the first time this had happened in Crumps.

The main story on this trip occurred after the caving was completed. When we arrived at the surface a heavy downpour was in progress. Joe then managed to get his car terminally stuck in the dirt road into Crumps. After much pushing and shoving in the rain we eventually gave up and walked out the road. We convinced a local to drive us to Cave City. Joe then called Jim Quinlin, the Mammoth Park geologist, and Jim drove us to the bus station. We then took the bus to the Louisville, caught a cab to the airport and then picked up a rental car when the rental car place opened at 5:30 am. We then drove back to Lexington in time for me to catch my flight to Mississippi! That was my last survey trip into Crumps with Joe.

A year or so later I found myself in Detroit. Coincidently, Joe moved to Lansing, MI, just 90 miles away. We eventually connected and went to a Michigan Interlakes Grotto meeting in Grand Rapids. Joe was still caving in Kentucky and tried to convince me to participate, but my knees and memories of Crumps had still not healed and I was reluctant. My fate was sealed, however, when Keith Ortiz moved to Detroit and took up residence in the second floor of my house. Several months later I found myself leading Keith and Chip Hopper back to Twin Falls in Crumps – perhaps one of the nastiest trips in the system. At this time Joe was not doing anything in Crumps, preferring to spend his time in Grady's and other caves, and also scoping out and servicing all of the sinks, depressions and rat holes in Hart County.

During a subsequent two year period a lot of surface work was done in the Fisher Ridge area, led mostly by Keith Ortiz and Chip Hopper. The Fisher Ridge Cave was discovered in 1981. Joe did not participate at all during the first year of exploration of FRCS. I do not know exactly why. I have heard that he did not believe that FRCS would amount to much, or perhaps it was a territory ownership problem. However, after a year or so Joe saw the writing on the wall and began work in Fisher.

Joe's relationship with the cavers in FRCS could be described as stormy, at best. The Fisher Ridge cavers can be classified as “a set of loosely connected, but highly independent cavers,” to be kind. Joe was more independent than most. He frequently led his own trips with his own people and was fairly tight lipped about his explorations. He wrote monthly trip reports for the DUG SCOOPS, but the trips he described were from several months before. He also frequently hung on to his survey data for longer than I thought necessary.

I did several trips with Joe into FRCS, but our grouping was more of a marriage of convenience than planning. On one trip, Peter Quick, Joe and myself explored and surveyed a side lead off of Fisher Avenue. The passage eventually became low and plugged, but we continued our progress by digging in and up into going passage. Joe complained about squeezing through the dig but he eventually made it. On the way out we quickly realized that the dig geometry and Joe's body would not match properly in this direction – he would not fit and he was on the wrong side! Pete and I spent a few hours attempting to increase the passage dimensions – but it was now mostly solid rock. In desperation we ended up pushing Joe through – with Pete pushing Joe's feet from the inside and myself pulling his coverall collars from the outside – much against Joe's protestations and exhortations.

On another trip, Joe and I surveyed another side lead off of Fisher avenue. At one point we laid down on the fluffy sand for a nap. Joe began to snore instantly. I said “Joe!” and he instantly replied “What?” This experience has convinced me that Joe begins snoring while he is still awake.

The most memorable incident related to Joe is the famous “treachery trip.” This occurred after the montrous flood of 1984, when a dirt bank was washed away from south Fisher Avenue exposing several miles of easy trunk passage beyond. This was accidently discovered by Chip Hopper and Joe on one of Joe's famous mop-up trips. Chip and Joe decided to keep the discovery a secret, for whatever reason. The next month found Peter Quick, Joe and myself in Pete's van headed towards Kentucky. During the drive down Joe revealed his secret discovery to Pete and I. We were both very angry and spent several hours verbally bashing away at Joe as we sped our way towards Kentucky. Joe eventually went to sleep – but the Joe bashing continued unabated! I do feel regret about this incident. As editor of the DUG Scoops I usurped my authority as editor and demanded a written apology from all involved to be published in the Scoops. Joe eventually relented with an article that I believe came as close as we'll ever get to an apology.

In 1993 I moved to the upper peninsula of Michigan. I think I saw Joe last at one of Joan Miller's parties at her cottage along lake Huron.

Joe was certainly a colorful caver and contributed a lot to central Kentucky caving – both above and below ground. He will be missed. We frequently called him the King of Central Kentucky Caving. I have very fond memories of all his trips, articles, antics, digs, blasts, politics, secrets, and other activities. I still have many of Joe's famous post cards exhorting me on to new discoveries.

When I first began caving actively in the early 1970s I was interested mostly in finding new cave passage. When I began surveying, the footage and station count were the most important issues. At my present place in life, I realize that I was wrong. It is not the footage but the people. I'll always have the footage – but this is not what memories are made of. The memories are made from experiences with people – and this is something that I will have forever. Joe contributed a lot to these memories. I feel very grateful for having Joe share his life with me.