About this episode

This episode recounts the harrowing tale of Floyd Collins, who became trapped in a cave in 1925 and the subsequent rescue efforts.

In the dead of Winter, 1925, cave explorer Floyd Collins crawled, wiggled, and wormed 55 feet below the surface of a sandhole. He was on the hunt for a magnificent cave. But when his lantern began to flicker, he turned back. He re-entered the narrow passageway. In the confusion of darkness, he kicked a protruding rock. When he did, a boulder dropped on his leg. Dirt and debris buried him. Floyd Collins was trapped, 55 feet underground, in the complete dark. All he could do was scream and hope that someone would come to his rescue. Remember, kids, history hoes always cite their sources! For this episode, Norm pulled from: Collins, Homer, and John Lehrberger. The Life and Death of Floyd Collins . Cave Books, 2001. Kem, David Randolph. The Kentucky Cave Wars: The Century That Shaped Mammoth Cave National Park . David Randolph Kem, 2014. Murray, Robert K., and Roger W. Brucker. Trapped! The Story of Floyd Collins . University Press of Kentucky, 1982. https://archive.org/details/trappedstoryofst0000murr . Reilly, Lucas. “The 1925 Cave Rescue That Captivated the Nation.” Mental Floss, July 13, 2018…

People in this episode

Host: Norm

Topics covered

• Floyd Collins
• cave rescue
• history
• true crime
• exploration
• trapped

Keywords

• Floyd Collins
• cave rescue
• 1925
• Kentucky
• trapped
• exploration
• history

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Cave Books, University Press of Kentucky, Mental Floss

Books & works: The Life and Death of Floyd Collins, The Kentucky Cave Wars: The Century That Shaped Mammoth Cave National Park, Trapped! The Story of Floyd Collins, The 1925 Cave Rescue That Captivated the Nation

More episodes of An Old Timey Podcast

• 111: Floyd Collins Is Trapped in a Cave (Part 1) · July 8, 2026 · 1h 12m
• 110: Did William Howard Taft Get Stuck In A Bathtub? · July 1, 2026 · 60 min
• 109: JC Penney Loses *Almost* Everything (Finale, Rebroadcast) · June 24, 2026 · 2h 1m
• 108: JC Penney Becomes Rich *and* Cool (Part 3, Rebroadcast) · June 17, 2026 · 1h 47m

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