James Anderson Kartchner (1901-1986)

Biography
Class of 1919. James Kartchner graduated from BYH in College Hall on Wednesday, May 28, 1919. Source: 1919 Graduation Program. Collegiate Grad of BYU, Class of 1926. James A. Kartchner. He received a BS Degree in Horticulture in 1926. Source: Annual Record, B.Y. University, Book 10, page 322. James Anderson Kartchner, educator and rancher, of St. David, Arizona, was born on January 19, 1901, in Provo, Utah. His parents were Mark Elisha Kartchner and Ellen Matilda Loveless. He married twice: first, to Harriet Marie Adams who was born on October 9, 1904, in Logan, Utah [or Newmarket, Flint, Wales]. Her parents were John Quincy Adams and Armenia Julia Parry Adams. She married James A. Kartchner on June 6, 1928, in Logan, Utah. She died less than one year later on April 5, 1929, in Idaho Falls, Idaho. Her interment, Logan, Utah. James A. Karchner second married Lois Martineau on June 3, 1930, in Colonia, Chihuahua, Mexico.

Lois was born on September 27, 1910 in Garcia, Chihuahua, Mexico. Lois was the daughter of Charles Henry Martineau and Florence Whetten. She died on November 3, 2001. James A. Kartchner died on June 12, 1986. James A. Kartchner was the owner of the property where, in 1974, large caverns were discovered, which in 1988 became Kartchner Caverns State Park. James Kartchner may have been the first to notice something a little unusual about the hills containing the cave that now bears his name. Kartchner was an educator and a rancher in St. David, a small town east of the Whetstone Mountains, in southeastern Arizona. Whenever he and his sons would ride the hills to check on their cattle, their horses' hoofs made a peculiar sound on the limestone rock. "You know," Kartchner commented to his sons, "it sounds like these hills are hollow."

Kartchner had bought land in the Whetstones, about 40 miles southeast of Tucson, in 1942. It would be another 32 years before he or anyone else would discover just how hollow the hills were. Various spelunkers, amateur cave explorers, had poked around the Whetstones hoping to find a new cave. Cavers look for certain telltale clues. If the area contains limestone, it may also contain caves because limestone dissolves when water seeps through it, forming underground cavities. Sinkholes are another good sign. A sinkhole is a depression in the ground created when these cavities collapse.

The Whetstones have the most extensive limestone deposits in southern Arizona and are riddled with sinkholes. But until 1974 no one had ever found a cave worth talking about. In the many years since 1978, when Randy Tufts and Gary Tenen, the two college students who discovered the caves, first approached James Kartchner in his front yard, they have repeatedly commented on the cave's good fortune to remain unknown until it could be protected. More precious to them than gold was their 1974 discovery of an untouched natural treasure, a living cave with growing calcite formations, hidden under the desert floor for more than a million years.

James Kartchner had been a science teacher and the superintendent of schools in St. David. He and his wife, Lois, had 10 children of their own and two that they adopted. Six of their children are medical doctors, and one has a Ph.D. They quickly realized James Kartchner was at least as interested in geology and related matters as they were. When Kartchner was 78, he and five of his sons accompanied Tufts and Tenen on a tour of the cave in 1979. "We were in complete disbelief at the size and beauty of it," said Max Kartchner, an anesthesiologist who lives in Benson. "It was almost a sacred experience, so exquisite and out of this world."

Finally, in 1984, Tufts and Tenen decided that maybe the state of Arizona would be interested in purchasing the site to develop it as a state park. The discoverers approached Governor Bruce Babbitt. The governor was interested, but wanted to see the cave for himself. Babbitt, who had a background in geology before he became a lawyer, toured the cave in April 1985. He brought along his sons, Chris, 10, and T.J., 8, first making them promise they would keep it a secret. He also lectured them on not touching anything and following directions carefully. Impressed with what he saw, Babbitt threw his support behind the clandestine movement to get the cave into public ownership. It took three more years, two more governors, two more state parks directors, and some tense, behind-the-scenes political maneuvering, before the state finally bought the cave.

Everyone involved was so consumed with the need for secrecy that State Parks Director Ken Travous asked legislative leaders to write a bill authorizing the cave's purchase but to obscure the bill's language so that no one would know exactly what was being purchased until the day of the vote. The Kartchner's sold 550 acres above and around the caverns to the state, creating a new park where environmental awareness and preservation, rather than recreation, were the key elements.

The Kartchner's, who had owned the ranch since 1941, couldn't have anticipated that the development and commercialization of the cave would cost more than $28 million. Kartchner Caverns became a state park so that it could be preserved and protected and used as a living classroom where the public could learn something about earth sciences and the fragile life of a cave environment. "But," asks Tufts, "what is the key point about Kartchner? Not that it is beautiful nor that it will spur growth in Benson, but the fact that it is in excellent condition and is being kept that way for posterity. That's why it's attractive."

On June 12, 1986, James Anderson Kartchner died at the age of 85.