Intriguing Wild West Ghost Towns

Ghost towns exist across the world but rarely are they more intriguing than in the United States, where former mining towns played host to the pioneers of their day.  Other towns grew up around the railroad, as civilisation gradually spread from the eastern seaboard to the Wild West.  Reasons for their abandonments are wide and varied, from the inherent lawlessness of the era to the depletion of natural resources.  Whatever the reasons, ghost towns provide a fascinating glance into our history.

Bodie is a ghost town in California east of the imposing Sierra Nevada mountains.  The town is thought to be named after W.S. Bodey, one of a group of prospectors who discovered gold there in 1859.  The discovery of more profitable gold-bearing ore in 1876 turned Bodie into a frontier boomtown.

At its peak it had two banks, four volunteer fire companies, a railroad, several daily newspapers, a brass band and post office.  In the true spirit of the Wild West, it also had a jail to accomodate the pervasive lawlessness.  Main Street was a mile long and lined with 65 saloons.  Not surprisingly then, murder and shootouts were common place in this wild land where a man’s life was all too often measured by the speed at which he could draw his gun.

Decline set in around 1880, when miners were lured away to other promising boomtowns like the fabled Tombstone, Arizona.  Bodie lingered on as a more family orientated community, with a new Methodist church and mines remaining profitable as technologically advanced.  But by 1912, the Standard Consolidated Mine had closed and the last copy of the Bodie Miner newspaper was printed.

By 1917 the railroad had closed and gold mining in the U.S. was halted to make way for war production.  It never resumed.  In 1962, the town became Bodie State Historic Park, and receives around 200,000 visitors annually (although it is rumoured to be closing soon due to budget cuts).  Spookily, many of the supplies and household goods are as they were left years ago when the town was finally abandoned.

Calico is a ghost town also located in California, this time in the Mojave Desert.  Unlike Bodie, it was a silver mining town and once boasted around 500 mines.

The town was abandoned in 1907 and its last original resident, Lucy Bell Lane, died in the 1960s.  Her house now forms the main town museum.

Not quite so authentic today, Calico was extensively renovated by Walter Knott around 1951, andvisitors can now enjoy staged gun fights (rather than the real thing!), gold panning and trips on the old Calico & Odessa Railroad, bringing the past of this once lawless Wild West town back to life.  By all accounts, the town could soon be heading for the big screen!

Not strictly a ghost town in the Wild West sense, but according to photographer Trey Ratcliff, writing in January 2009, these buildings had been recently abandoned for one reason or another.

They are interesting for two main reasons: first, the high definition photography really brings out the atmosphere in these old buidings; second, their bright colours generate a lively and jovial feel which contrasts with their abandonment.

They look inviting and forbidding at the same time, and leave us wondering why they became abandoned in the first place.