Cardiff, Illinois, was built on this site in 1899 after the discovery of underground coal deposits. A mine was sunk and a relatively large town developed within months. Originally known as North Campus, it incorporated as the Village of Cardiff in May, 1900. A series of mine explosions from March 12-16, 1903, killed nine mine workers, and three men remain entombed in the mine. A second mine was sunk to the west, and mining operations resumed. At its peak, more than 2,000 people lived in Cardiff, which had a church, a school, two banks, two grain elevators, a semi-pro baseball team, a bottling plant, railroad passenger service, a hotel, numerous saloons, and other businesses. Cardiff prospered until the high quality coal ran out and the Wabash Railroad, the mine's biggest customer, refused to buy Cardiff coal. The mine closed in 1912, and a total of 18 men died in mine accidents there. Almost as fast as the town developed, it disappeared as houses and other buildings were dismantled or moved whole. Today Cardiff is gone, though it remains a legally incorporated village, and two large hills of mine waste and farmland covering former homes, stores, yards, and streets mark the place where its people lived, worked, and died.