Nebraskans dug 6,000 feet of tunnels into a hill and now you can walk through them

It’s North America’s only public chalk mine

Central Nebraska is not where you’d expect to find yourself underground.

But two miles south of Scotia, a village of about 300 people in Greeley County, a hillside hides more than 6,000 feet of honeycombed tunnels carved from soft white rock.

Happy Jack Peak and Chalk Mine sits along the Loup Rivers Scenic Byway, and it’s the only publicly accessible room-and-pillar chalk mine on the continent.

Above the mine, the peak rises 120 feet with views of the North Loup River Valley and farmland stretching to the horizon. What’s inside the hill is even better than what’s on top of it.

A cheerful trapper gave the hill its name

The mine gets its name from Jack Swearengen, a trapper and government scout who welcomed settlers arriving to the North Loup Valley in 1872.

Swearengen had a reputation for being cheerful, and he lived in a dugout he carved into the white chalk bluffs above the valley. The tallest hill became Happy Jack’s Peak, and the earliest settlers used it as a lookout.

Five years later, a man named Ed Wright started mining the soft rock for building material.

In 1887, he used those blocks to build a general store in Scotia that still stands today, now listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

Walk through carved rooms 65 degrees all summer

Guided tours take you through the underground tunnels, where you walk among rooms and pillars left behind by miners who cut the rock by hand.

The temperature inside sits in the mid-60s year-round, so on a hot Nebraska afternoon in July, you’ll feel the cool hit you the moment you step through the entrance.

Tour guides stop along the way to point out fossil imprints pressed into the walls, including ancient jellyfish, giant earthworms and sand dollars.

You can also spot old hand tools the miners left behind, and at the end, you get to take a piece of chalk home.

The “chalk” is actually 10-million-year-old lake sediment

Here’s the twist. What the settlers called chalk turned out to be something else entirely.

Scientists later identified the rock as calcareous diatomite, a soft sedimentary material formed from the remains of tiny organisms called diatoms.

Those diatoms settled at the bottom of an ancient lake that covered the area six to 10 million years ago, during the late Miocene epoch.

As sediment piled up over millions of years, the deposits hardened into the white rock the miners eventually dug out. Only two known diatomite mines exist in the entire country, and this is one of them.

Ancient rodent burrows cover the walls and ceilings

In 2002, University of Nebraska-Lincoln geologist Matt Joeckel visited the mine and immediately noticed something no one had paid much attention to before. Fossil rodent burrows covered the walls and ceilings.

Ancient rodents had dug into the soft rock about five million years ago, and sand filled the tunnels and preserved their shape.

Joeckel and researcher Shane Tucker published a study calling them some of the most exceptional fossil mammal burrows in the world. A reviewer from Harvard’s Peabody Museum called the study authoritative.

The burrows now help scientists piece together how rodents and grasslands evolved together on the Great Plains.

Motorcycle races once tore through the tunnels

After the early mining days, the tunnels sat empty for years.

In the 1930s, an Omaha paint company reopened the mine and pulled the material for use in paint, whitewash, cement, polishes, and chicken feed.

Mining stopped again after World War II, and the caverns went quiet. But not for long.

During the decades that followed, locals found their own uses for the space. Motorcycle races tore through the tunnels. Underground gatherings took over the carved-out rooms.

In 1967, the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission bought the property and turned it into a wayside park.

Volunteers pulled the mine back from the brink

By the 1990s, the mine was in bad shape. Debris filled the tunnels and graffiti covered the walls.

Local residents stepped in and formed the Happy Jack Chalk Mine Association, then purchased the property from the village of Scotia in 1996.

Starting the next year, volunteers installed lighting, built stairs up the peak, added retaining walls and set up displays of old mining equipment.

Dozens of community members donated their time and labor to bring the place back. The mine reopened as a tourist attraction, still run entirely by local volunteers.

The climb to the top earns you three-county views

Trails and steps lead from the mine entrance up more than 120 feet to the top of Happy Jack Peak, which sits at roughly 2,000 feet above sea level.

It’s the highest point along the North Loup River Valley, and the climb will remind your legs it’s a real workout. The steps are uneven and steep in places.

At the top, a bench lets you sit and look out over miles of farmland and prairie rolling in every direction. Keep your eyes up during the climb, too.

Visitors have spotted bald eagles overhead and deer moving along the hillside.

Bats roost inside while eagles soar above

Small bats hang from the ceilings inside the mine, and you’ll likely see a few sleeping or flying during your tour. Scientists have studied the bat species that use the tunnels as a summer roost.

Above ground, the site sits where oak woodlands meet mixed grass prairie, a combination that supports more than 150 varieties of native plants.

The surrounding stretch of the Loup Rivers Scenic Byway gives you regular chances to spot bald eagles, migratory birds, deer and river otters along the water.

Every tour is private to your group

The mine runs from Memorial Day through Labor Day, with guided tours available throughout the day. Every tour is private to your group, led by a local volunteer who knows the history inside and out.

The walk through the mine is level and easy, lasting about 15 to 30 minutes depending on how many questions you ask.

Outside, the grounds are free to explore and include picnic areas, so pack a lunch and make an afternoon of it. Leashed dogs can join you on the grounds and inside the mine.

The scenic byway follows three rivers through open prairie

Happy Jack sits along the Loup Rivers Scenic Byway, which winds through central Nebraska’s Sandhills country following the North Loup, Middle Loup and South Loup Rivers.

The drive takes you past rolling farmland, red barns and wide-open prairie.

Nearby, Fort Hartsuff State Historical Park preserves a former infantry outpost from the 1870s, one of the most complete small prairie forts in the region.

The North Loup River draws canoeists, kayakers and tubers in summer.

The byway also passes through Dannebrog, known as Nebraska’s Danish capital, where you’ll find a historic bakery and heritage festivals.

Scotia’s downtown is built from the mine’s own rock

The village of Scotia sits just two miles north of the mine and deserves a quick stop. Several of the town’s earliest buildings went up using chalk blocks cut straight from Happy Jack’s bluffs.

The most well-known is the Ed Wright Building, a general store from 1887 that landed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1979.

About 300 people call Scotia home, and the town keeps the feel of a quiet, welcoming place where people wave from their porches.

Residents here take real pride in their chalk block buildings and the mine’s role in their story.

Explore Happy Jack Peak and Chalk Mine in Nebraska

You’ll find Happy Jack Peak and Chalk Mine off Nebraska Highway 11, about two miles south of Scotia in Greeley County.

The mine runs guided tours from Memorial Day through Labor Day, with grounds open dawn to dusk year-round.

Admission to the grounds is free, and mine tours cost $15 for adults, $12 for seniors, $10 for children ages 5 to 12, and free for kids 4 and under and veterans.

The site sits about an hour north of Grand Island, making it an easy day trip or a solid stop on a longer road trip through the Sandhills.

This article was created with AI assistance and human editing.

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