Gravel Pits -- An Attraction for the Ages

From the Cooper Postcard Collection, MDAH

Based on the hand-tinted linen print and the subjects' Victorian clothing, this postcard of a gathering of people at a gravel pit in Pike County is easily a century old.  It just goes to show that people have long  been attracted to quarries, despite their inherit dangers.

But this being near St. Mary's of the Pines at Chatawa, could there be more to this story?  Perhaps they were looking for the Chatawa Monster, or trying to get a glimpse of the monkeys that nuns who taught at the nearby boarding school swore they saw playing in the surrounding tree tops?

For more on those local legends/mysteries, please see this Walt Grayson link covering those tidbits and more, and for even further reading, including the meaning of the Choctaw word Chatawa, please see this link.