Take a ride down an elevator 650’ below the surface of Hutchinson, Kan., and you’ll find endless miles of tunnels leading to active salt mines dating back over a century.
“They mined out over 980 acres of salt in this mine. On a daily basis they produce right around 5,000 tons of salt,” says Lee Spence, president and CEO of Underground Vaults and Storage.
About 80% of this salt is used to treat roads during the winter, the remainder is used for agricultural purposes. As the salt was mined, vast areas underground were now large empty spaces.
Salt and Storage
That “new” space spurred an idea for some men associated with the World War II “Monuments Men” group who worked to recover valuable items Hitler had seized and stored in salt mines in German controlled areas. Could those cavernous areas of this Kansas salt mine be used to store important and valuable records, artifacts and items?
It was the beginning of Underground Vaults and Storage. Today the company manages over one hundred “bays” that each have 15,000 square feet of room. About 30% to 40% of their business is storing movie film from Hollywood’s studios.
“We get a lot of the major motion picture studios that store with us because of the preservation of the film that the salt provides and it’s the security as well,” Spence explains.
Movie Memorabilia
The temperature underground is a constant 68 degrees with humidity between 40% and 45%. Many directors and motion picture companies still like to shoot on film. There are rows upon rows of shelves filled with movie film.
“We go back to the 1920s during the silent films, the black and white films, I’ve seen some films with Charlie Chaplin’s name on them,” Spence says.
Lee can’t mention all the original films stored here, but titles like “The Wizard of Oz”, “Gone with the Wind”, “Ben Hur” and the “Star Wars” collection are all here.
You can’t tour the storage side of the business, but you can take salt mine tours which show how they use the mines for securing film and movie memorabilia plus items like medical records, employer files and much more.
The business continues to grow because it seems all of us could always use a little extra space to store something.
“Yeah, we’re always pack rats and people are always leery of throwing something away because you always might need something,” Spence says.
