The "Having A Dungeon In Your Basement" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Sitting in my car in front of a home in nearby Marietta, Pennsylvania.  Home is pretty neat with it's wood siding, what appears to be wooden shingles, a wooden gate, a tall wooden fence, a dungeon in the basement and a cave at the end of a long stairwell off the living room.

Front of the home in Marietta, Pennsylvania

If you love wood...this is the place for you.  T'he home has belonged to Whitney and Shawn for over 20 years now and they have decided that it is time to put it up for sale since they are moving due to a job change.  The home is in Marietta, Pennsylvania, about five miles from Lancaster, Pennsylvania.  Years ago, Whitney spotted the home with the dungeon basement and before long she and her husband, Shawn had purchased it.  

In the living room is a door heading into the cave.

When they moved into the house, it had two bedrooms, one bathroom and damage from a leaky roof.  It also had a long ramp off the living room that stretched to the end of the property's backyard.  They moved to the house with their son in 1998.  It was the couple's first family home with a most unusual history to it.  

Another look into the cave.

The family grew and so did the house.  They raised the ceiling and added a large picture window on the front of the home.  They also aded a third bedroom, a second bathroom and replaced the narrow spiral staircase.  While during the reconstruction, they found a sign congratulating them for buying the home.  The sign was from the former owners.  As far as the basement was concerned, they added railroad ties as steps which replaced an earthen ramp.  They also added lighting down the pathway.  

Living room with door to cave on the left.

They talked about adding an underground swimming pool with a billiards table nearby.  Perhaps even a skating park might work!  While talking to a neighbor, they found that the place was a horse stable and beer distributor and the cave was a cold cellar to store the beer.  Some one told them that the underground area was meant to be a bomb shelter.  They did find an artillery shell in the cave.  The history of the house was traced in the newspaper archives back to the early 1800s as one of the parcels that a Mr. John Myers laid out.  In the 1950s the home had four frame garages, but the home's history ended in 1918 with a bankruptcy case of a Mr. John A. Mouk in 1918.  Mr. Mouk was a farmer who owned nearby Chickies Park.  He operated a coal office in Marietta and could be that he stored oil in this cave they found.  Mr. Mouk was a notable bee-keeper who had hives near an old Brick Tavern.  He harvested about 1,000 pounds of honey each season so perhaps part of the basement was used for honey storage.  Shawn did find two vents in the home's backyard which might have gone to the far end of the cavern which may have caved in at one time.  Across the street from the home was a silk mill where there was a similar archway that's now sealed.  The more they found, the more they wondered what could have been there.  After Whitney's death in December, most of the McGrew family is ready for a slower pace and are moving south to a spot with fewer neighbors and lower taxes, according to Shawn.  An auction this pst December only drew one bid which was way to low.  The property is still up for sale at present.  The cave still remains and perhaps someone will make it into a man cave in the near future.  The address for the house, just in case you may want to view it, is 434 E. Market Street in Marietta, Pennsylvania.  It has 3 bedrooms, 2 full bathrooms and is 2,178 square feet in size.  Oh yeah!  It has a cave with it!  The listing price in the newspaper as of April 29, 2022 was $297,000.  Perhaps you may love a house with  a cave and a long ramp.  Doesn't everyone?  It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.