Jamestown Mall Cave?

[Whitepanther]

Heard this recently from a pretty reliable source who works in the corporate leasing industry. They said that a cave was incidentally discovered during the construction of Jamestown Mall. I have yet to come up with anything else on it in terms of research on it. The person who told me this also added that there was evidence discovered at the time suggesting it contained mastodon fossils? I don’t know what to make of it and am just passing along this one as a lead if anyone wants to look into it since there’s activity on site currently.

[Nicotti]

Are the building plans for the mall available some place? If there was a cave found in the footprint they probably had to shore up that area more or backfill part/all of the cave. It may be shown on the working plans.

[Chubz]

Interesting, with how many mammoth fossils have been discovered along the river this isn't too hard to believe.

Although given the close proximity to coldwater creek, even if we knew how to access the cave, it might be a radiated mess at this point. Would love for someone to find some more info though.

[Whitepanther]

Nicotti and Chubz you both bring up excellent points.

I had no knowledge about the mastodon finds along the river. I will say though that looking to the west from 367 or upstream where it crosses Coldwater Creek, I’ve always been suspicious by that area as far as cave potential goes. There’s supposedly another upstream from its fallout at the river which probably isn’t that big but would still be cool.

Old Jamestown is the only place I’ve ever come across anything like this but that town has this unique designation as a karst preservation district. Some of the deepest sinks I’ve seen in this state are in Old Jamestown and in neighboring Spanish Lake.

Nicotti you have a point about the plans. In certain instances I’ve been able to wrestle plans loose from the city recorder of deeds office. But unfortunately I don’t know anyone in a similar position with the county. The “As-Built” plans are something I’ve heard people refer to a lot but I don’t know much about them. I know there’s supposed to be a hard copy with that distinction from a project that includes all move adds or changes and change orders like what you’d be talking about. But I don’t know if there’s a database for that kind of thing or not. In theory I think the As-Built’s are filed with the local government and fire department maybe? Hopefully someone who knows more can help us understand.

[Chris]

AS someone who deals with them (or often wishes they were available) most As-Builts tend to disappear into the cosmic aether right after the building is built, much less decades later.

What you'll really want is the geotech report, if there was one, from when it was built.

[Whitepanther]

What you'll really want is the geotech report, if there was one, from when it was built.

Excellent info!! Thank you Chris.

[Chubz]

Nicotti and Chubz you both bring up excellent points.

I had no knowledge about the mastodon finds along the river. I will say though that looking to the west from 367 or upstream where it crosses Coldwater Creek, I’ve always been suspicious by that area as far as cave potential goes. There’s supposedly another upstream from its fallout at the river which probably isn’t that big but would still be cool.

Technically it's "the other river", but Principia College over above Grafton, IL has unearthed mammoth/mastodon remains on their property at least twice since the 90s.

"As the bird flys" (or maybe "as the mammoth walks"), it's not too far at all. Likely they are littered all over the area if we were able to search deep enough.

[Nicotti]

Old Jamestown is the only place I’ve ever come across anything like this but that town has this unique designation as a karst preservation district. Some of the deepest sinks I’ve seen in this state are in Old Jamestown and in neighboring Spanish Lake.

I saw that when I was doing some research on it, after your post. It looks like the preservation district is on the north side of 67, but not south of 67, which is obvious why when you look at the sinkhole map.

Jamestown Mall Area Sinks.JPG (84.68 KiB) Viewed 138178 times

[Nicotti]

Trying to logic out where a potential cave might be on the property.
Based on the 72 photo, I wouldn't think that the cave was near the pond, otherwise the pond would've likely drained. The site seems to have a gentle slope from north to south, so while they *could* have found it while moving earth for the parking lot I don't think they would have dug very deep and I definitely don't see them breaking bedrock for the parking lot, I think it's more likely it was found while digging one of the buildings footprints.

1972:

Jamestown Mall 1972.JPG (104.59 KiB) Viewed 138178 times

1981:

Jamestown Mall 1981.JPG (211.91 KiB) Viewed 138178 times

1995:

Jamestown Mall 1995.JPG (103.51 KiB) Viewed 138178 times

[Nicotti]

1955 shows some good land contouring pre-pond. If I had to bet on a spot based only on these images I'd guess somewhere in the highlighted area.

Jamestown Mall 1955.JPG (125 KiB) Viewed 138176 times

[Whitepanther]

Trying to logic out where a potential cave might be on the property

Good lort Nicotti these are killer observations! Let me process all this and reply then. Excellent finds though.

[Nicotti]

1955 shows some good land contouring pre-pond. If I had to bet on a spot based only on these images I'd guess somewhere in the highlighted area.

The straighter n/s wash se of the highlighted one is also a good contender. I doubt a cave would have been found there during the og construction though as it looks like they smoothed it for the parking lot, unless they found it while putting in storm water drainage. But when they added that eastern expansion they would've dug that area all up.

Course this is all just a guess. I'm just assuming the potential cave is along a natural land cut, based off it being a good place to look for cave entrances in general. I'm also making some assumptions of the geology and depth of soil to bedrock there based on what I can see in the pics. If they unearthed it while shifting dirt around for the parking lots, it could be anywhere.

[Whitepanther]

1955 shows some good land contouring pre-pond. If I had to bet on a spot based only on these images I'd guess somewhere in the highlighted area.

These photos are awesome. Being two dimensional though it makes judging terrain prior to grading difficult. The following part of this reply in this paragraph really doesn’t pertain to this site as much as it does in general because there was no known historical entrance. What I’m most used to seeing when it comes to caves found in the middle of fields are that a random grouping of trees are often growing out of and/or just around the perimeter of the sinkhole. Sometimes that group of trees and vegetation are so concentrated to one small area they can even disguise the sinkhole from view making it identifiable only because it’s in the middle of a field that’s being farmed. In other words it’s out of place so much that it sticks out like a sore thumb.

This is a very different ordeal though as you pointed out already. I agree with your assessment about it being a lot more plausible that if the cave rumor is true it would have most likely been from the footprint of the building itself instead of the parking lot. I’m quoting the comments you made about the 55 photo because I think you nailed it with your observation. I’m tempted to identify two or three other spots that stick out to me but as you said it could literally be anywhere in this instance. Having said that though the whole site slope down quite drastically towards the rear of the property and the mall if I’m remembering it right even though it was one floor of shopping was on a higher plane on the front section closest to Lindbergh. That would’ve likely meant the majority of earth mover work would have been down on the front section not far from where you highlighted on the 55 image.

I’m going to wrestle with news papers dot com for the 70-72 timeline and see if that reveals anything else. Thanks again though with the great work here.

[Whitepanther]

Searching terms on the newspapers site is awfully expensive for how tedious it is. You can’t use search hacks like “index.of” or even separate search terms by periods to only get results in that order like “Jamestown.mall.construction”. If one of our IT savvy friends can help an old guy out on tips for that please let me know.

I’ll keep chipping away here but the good news is I’ve traced down the groundbreaking ceremony of the mall to the week of October 8, 1972.

[Whitepanther]

The latest edition of the RFT did a big feature on the history of Jamestown Mall. It doesn’t go as far as mentioning finding a cave but it’s pretty interesting:



The parking lot probably hides ancient treasures-
In studying the history of the Old Jamestown area over the years, I've learned just how old it really is. Located not far from the confluence of two great North American rivers — the Missouri and the Mississippi — it was a land of natural abundance that attracted both indigenous people and frontier settlers. And before that - way "megafauna" Ice Age animals, who gathered near a large lake that had formed at an ice dam near the mouth of Coldwater Creek.

That was 35,000 years ago, according to Joe Harl of the Archaeological Research Center of St. Louis, who says that since then, "Many Pleistocene animal bones have been discovered along Coldwater Creek ... and numerous bones have been found during construction in this area."

Which may help to explain a story I heard from a longtime Old Jamestown resident, who watched the mall being built: While earthmovers were clearing the land, she noticed a group of people with
"little paintbrushes" working in a roped-off, square plot. She wasn't able to get up close but ended up talking with one of the crew, who told her they were archaeologists and had found, in her telling, "evidence of saber-toothed tiger!" She later heard that mastodon bones were found as well.
But unfortunately the earthmovers kept moving, she told me, edging ever closer to the roped off plot, and within two weeks it was plowed over and filled in, soon to be covered with pavement.

The parking lot definitely hides sinkholes.
Of all the things that made Jamestown Mall unique, this was the one that sealed its fate: JVJ tried to get a jump on anticipated growth in the area and decided to build the mall before residential neighborhoods had really developed.

And then somebody figured out
— whoops! — the area is full of sinkholes and not conducive to high-density development.

Not only was the mall itself built on sinkhole land, in an area now recognized as "one of the finest examples of deep funnel-shaped sinkholes in the central United States" — with known sinkholes at the mall site still noted today on Division of Natural Resources maps — but all of those new subdivisions and households that the developer had gambled on in the early 1970s basically never materialized, all due to the geological wonder known as karst/sinkhole topography, now officially protected in the Florissant Karst Preservation District.