Why this park
Dunbar Cave State Park keeps 140 acres in Clarksville, in Montgomery County. Swan Lake, made by damming the cave's stream, lies before its mouth, and trails climb through hardwoods to a restored prairie.
What makes the place worth drawing is what two eras left in and around one cave. On the cave walls, about 800 years ago, Mississippian people drew and carved figures. At the mouth stands a bandstand on concrete arches, where Clarksville danced to big bands and to Roy Acuff. In August 2026, NewsChannel 5 reported, park crews were stripping decades of paint from the arches to bring back the bare concrete.
The story
People have sheltered in the cave's mouth for over 10,000 years, the park says. A 2012 study led by Jan Simek, a University of Tennessee archaeologist, found that they also mined minerals and buried their dead far inside. Art on the walls was recognized in January 2005, and Simek's team recorded 35 drawings and carvings, most likely Mississippian: geometric shapes, abstract designs and human figures, among them a hero warrior known from other Mississippian art. Centuries later, the park says, Cherokee visitors wrote there in their own syllabary, once in 1855.
The art is protected: the cave is gated, visitors see it only on a guided tour, and the park works with Cherokee people on how it is told. In February 2025 the highest flood on record covered the art for the first time known. State archaeologists later found no harm to the pigments, The Art Newspaper reported.
From 1785 to 1864 the cave lay on a plantation, the park says, and enslaved people worked in it and kept grain and potatoes there. In 1864 formerly enslaved people from the Union army's refugee camp in Clarksville built a settlement by the cave, which the plantation's owner called, with contempt, Affricanna Town. Families there, many likely kin of soldiers in the 16th Regiment, United States Colored Troops, built their own homes from salvaged materials, the American Battlefield Trust says, and the town was gone by 1867.
Visitors' cabins went up in 1858 and a hotel after the Civil War, the Tennessee Encyclopedia says. New owners in 1931 lit the cave, enlarged the lake, built a swimming pool and a bathhouse, now the visitor center, and gave the mouth a concrete dance floor and a bandstand. Through the Depression the big bands came: Benny Goodman and Tommy Dorsey, the encyclopedia says, and Glenn Miller and Lena Horne, adds the Tennessee Music Pathways marker at the park.
The Grand Ole Opry star Roy Acuff bought the resort in 1948, publicized his purchase that Fourth of July weekend with Owen Bradley's orchestra, his own show and fireworks, and added a golf course and an amphitheater. His radio show went out from the cave. Acuff sold in 1966, by the marker's account, though other histories say 1963. The pool closed in 1967, and in 1973 the state bought the cave as a State Natural Area, where the cave is still recovering, the park says, from nearly a century of show-cave crowds.
When to go, and what to wear
Summer is cave season: tours run only from May through September, and the rest of the year the cave rests and its bats hibernate undisturbed. At NOAA's Clarksville WWTP station, under two miles away, July averages a high near 90°F and a low near 69°F, but underground it stays about 56°F, the park says, so bring a long-sleeve layer. Floors are wet and slick, with some crouching and, on longer tours, stairs: wear closed shoes that grip and clothes that can take mud, and carry a handheld flashlight, since a phone light won't do.
May is the wettest month, at about 5.6 inches, and heavy rain can flood the Lake Trail and even close the cave in tour season. April averages a high near 72°F and a low near 47°F. September is the driest month, and October averages a high near 72°F and a low near 48°F. Bring binoculars: migrating birds use the Lake Trail in spring and fall, and waterfowl winter on Swan Lake. January averages a high near 47°F and a low near 28°F: wear layers, a hat and gloves.
Know before you go
- Tours often sell out, so reserve ahead. Enter the Underworld, the tour that shows the art, takes ages 5 and up; the rougher Unknown Realms and Spray Hall tours take ages 8 and up.
- No photographs may be taken in the cave, which the park calls sacred to Indigenous people. The tours are not wheelchair accessible, but a virtual reality tour at the visitor center, for ages 10 and up, runs all year.
- White-nose syndrome, a fungal disease that kills bats, was found here in 2010, and tours came back under clean-caving rules; if your shoes or gear have been in another cave, ask the park first.
- Stay on the trails: about 3 miles, hikers only, pets leashed. The paved Resort Trail is wheelchair friendly. Pop-up tents are banned parkwide, grills and open flames at the picnic area, and RVs and trailers can't get in.
- Hours, fees and closures change, so check Dunbar Cave State Park's page before you go.
Sources: Tennessee Encyclopedia, "Dunbar Cave State Natural Area" (Carroll Van West) and "Roy C. Acuff" (Don Cusic), Tennessee Historical Society; Jan F. Simek and others, "The Prehistoric Cave Art and Archaeology of Dunbar Cave, Montgomery County, Tennessee," Journal of Cave and Karst Studies 74, no. 1 (2012); Friends of Dunbar Cave, "Park Information"; Tennessee Music Pathways marker for Dunbar Cave, as printed in "Five Tennessee Music Pathway markers placed in Clarksville," Main Street Clarksville (2022); American Battlefield Trust, "Affricanna Town"; Allison C. Meier, "Protecting North America's oldest cave art after an historic flood raised new alarms," The Art Newspaper (October 31, 2025); Chris Smith, "Flooding fills Dunbar Cave with mud, lifts boardwalks, causes possible damage to cave art," ClarksvilleNow (February 24, 2025); Derek Operle, "Floods may have damaged 800-year-old Native American cave art in Clarksville," WPLN News (February 28, 2025); Chris Davis, "Historic restoration project underway to restore the bandstand arches at Dunbar Cave State Park," NewsChannel 5 (August 10, 2026); Debbie Boen, "Clarksville residents interviewed for new Dunbar Cave film," Clarksville Online (January 20, 2008); Julia Koslowsky, "Dive into the History of Dunbar Cave," Visit Clarksville (April 26, 2023); "Cooling at the Cave back bigger than ever," Discover Clarksville (July 31, 2019); "Dunbar Cave State Park has reopened the cave to the public for hikes and tours," ClarksvilleNow (May 27, 2015); Trish Milburn, "Dunbar Cave State Park preserves historic cave art," The Tennessee Magazine (April 2020); NOAA, U.S. Climate Normals 1991–2020, Clarksville WWTP station; Wikipedia; Dunbar Cave State Park, tnstateparks.com.
