# Defunct Towns **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [October 20, 2007, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427 "2007-10-20T23:48:28Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![DudleyGarrett](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d9b06d/32.png) [@DudleyGarrett](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DudleyGarrett)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2007, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/1 "2007-10-20T23:48:28Z")
The thread in The Pit about cops doing their jobs inspired me to seek out new knowledge of more of these types of towns. [New Rome, Ohio](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Rome%2C_Ohio) (mentioned by me in the other thread) was essentially so corrupt that the state ordered it dissolved in 2004. It was a three block town (a village, really) on Ohio’s Interstate 40. Through the small town the speed limit dropped 10MPH, which led to way too many speeding tickets and other assorted harassments by local law enforcement. Town officials were self-appointed and turned out to be very bad people. Another creepy place is [Centrailia, Pennsylvania](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania), where since a mine fire started nearly 50 years ago (and is still burning), the town has essentially been wiped off he map. For some reason, to me there is something eerie (a feeling I apparently like) about towns that simply disappear. Do you know of any others? These Wikipedia links are pretty interesting reading, by the way. ---
**Author:** ![Ice\_Wolf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/dfb087/32.png) [@Ice\_Wolf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ice_Wolf)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2007, 11:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/2 "2007-10-20T23:58:44Z")
As with the US, New Zealand (and Australia) have stacks of ghost towns that vanished with mines ran out or shifted, and those simply flooded by hydro dams. That may not be what you were thinking of in terms of this thread, perhaps. ---
**Author:** ![Cub\_Mistress](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ea666f/32.png) [@Cub\_Mistress](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cub_Mistress)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/3 "2007-10-21T00:00:04Z")
[Times Beach Missouri](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_Beach,_Missouri) ---
**Author:** ![Tripler](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripler/32/21807_2.png) [@Tripler](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tripler)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/4 "2007-10-21T00:06:39Z")
Oh man, I could lay quite a few on ya: Ingomar, Monarch, Virginia City, Nevada City, Bannack, and Eddie’s Corner, Montana as well as Fortuna and Pettibone, North Dakota come to mind. . . Tripler I haven’t even started on Arizona yet. . . ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/5 "2007-10-21T00:08:08Z")
I was here only today. Ramsholt, with a church which no longer has a village to serve. Just a pub and a couple of farms. Edit: sorting out links ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/6 "2007-10-21T00:18:26Z")
Sorry, was working fine, then seemed to screw up, but seems to be fine again: I was [here](http://s52.photobucket.com/albums/g3/owainsutton/Oct%2020th/?action=view¤t=DSC00421.jpg) only today, etc. ---
**Author:** ![eleanorigby](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/ee7513/32.png) [@eleanorigby](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eleanorigby)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/7 "2007-10-21T00:34:09Z")
[QUOTE=GorillaMan] Sorry, was working fine, then seemed to screw up, but seems to be fine again: I was [here](http://s52.photobucket.com/albums/g3/owainsutton/Oct%2020th/?action=view¤t=DSC00421.jpg) only today, etc. [/QUOTE] That’s gorgeous! Do they get many people in of a Sunday? Bill Bryson wrote about Centralia PA in his book about America (I think it’s in A Walk in the Woods). The ground smokes, and there are streets and stop signs in an empty landscape. Very weird. I’d like to go there someday, just to see it. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/8 "2007-10-21T00:48:46Z")
[QUOTE=eleanorigby] That’s gorgeous! Do they get many people in of a Sunday? [/QUOTE] Probably not! Churches like this tend to have one or possibly two services a month, shared out with neighbouring parishes. ---
**Author:** ![alphaboi867](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/alphaboi867/32/3898_2.png) [@alphaboi867](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/alphaboi867)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/9 "2007-10-21T02:07:44Z")
[QUOTE=DudleyGarrett] …Another creepy place is [Centrailia, Pennsylvania](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralia,_Pennsylvania), where since a mine fire started nearly 50 years ago (and is still burning), the town has essentially been wiped off he map… [/QUOTE] So anyone want to see those graveyards? ---
**Author:** ![danceswithcats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9e8a1a/32.png) [@danceswithcats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/danceswithcats)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 3:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/10 "2007-10-21T03:19:26Z")
[QUOTE=eleanorigby] Bill Bryson wrote about Centralia PA in his book about America (I think it’s in A Walk in the Woods). The ground smokes, and there are streets and stop signs in an empty landscape. Very weird. I’d like to go there someday, just to see it. [/QUOTE] The landscape wasn’t empty, at least the last time I went through town. Parts of the main street shopping district were standing, and one or two commercial enterprises still operated. Off of main street, the residential streets were a mix of empty lots, overgrown with weeds, boarded up dwellings with large numbers painted on the plywood facing the street, and the neatly kept lawns of those residents who refused to leave. It was odd to watch an elderly lady sweeping her walkway just as she had undoubtedly done a thousand times before, her modest home bracketed by lots which had begun their return to the wild. ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/11 "2007-10-21T03:44:39Z")
[Meaderville, Montana](http://www.old-picture.com/scenes-rural-america/007/Meaderville-street-Montana-Main.htm) disappeared into the Berkeley Pit (currently one of the most polluted places on Earth) sometime during the mid-1980s. This picture is of personal interest because it shows the Rocky Mountain Cafe, at one of whose slot machines my mother started her silver dollar collection on her honeymoon in 1944. ---
**Author:** ![straykat23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c4cdca/32.png) [@straykat23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/straykat23)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/12 "2007-10-21T05:01:52Z")
Bodie, California, was once a gold mining town of 10,000 residents. According to the Wiki article: > [@](#): > > Bodie held a permanent residency through most of the 20th century, even after a fire ravaged much of the downtown business district in 1932. And some fun stuff: > [@](#): > > As a bustling gold mining center, Bodie had the amenities of larger towns, including two banks, a brass band, railroad, miner’s and mechanic’s unions, several newspapers, and a jail. At its peak 65 saloons lined Main Street, which was a mile long. Murders, shootouts, barroom brawls, and stagecoach holdups were regular occurrences. > > [snip] > > As with other remote mining towns, Bodie had a popular, though clandestinely important, red light district on the north end of town. From this is told the unsubstantiated story of Rosa May, a prostitute who, in the style of Florence Nightingale, came to the aid of the town menfolk when a serious epidemic struck the town at the height of its boom. She was credited with giving life-saving care to many, but was denied burial within the gates of the town cemetery, remaining a social outcast even to her death. [Bodie](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bodie%2C_California) Last Christmas I was given “Ghost Towns of Northern California,” that lists 50 deserted mining towns and some Chinese fishing villages around San Francisco Bay. Interesting stuff. [Ghost Towns of NorCal](http://www.amazon.com/Ghost-Northern-California-Pictorial-Discovery/dp/0896584429/ref=sr_1_1/103-3230376-2399056?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1192941508&sr=1-1) ---
**Author:** ![Spoons](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spoons/32/3141_2.png) [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 5:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/13 "2007-10-21T05:18:47Z")
The town of Saint-Jean-Vianney, in the province of Quebec, Canada, basically slid away one night in 1971. The story is briefly provided [here](http://www.trivia-library.com/a/landslide-in-saint-jean-vianney-canada-in-1971.htm), but I’ll quote a few points from the link: > [@](#): > > At Saint-Jean-Vianney, and other locations in the province of Quebec, there lies beneath the topsoil a 100’-thick bed of unstable clay. Interlaced with pockets of sand that may become saturated with moisture, the clay can dissolve and liquefy to flow like a river… > > It rained heavily in April and the water didn’t run off, but soaked into the ground to dissolve the sand-pocked clay. On May 4 at 10:45 P.M., the liquefied earth dropped 100’ to form a canyon a half mile wide… One by one, the homes on the east side of town slid into the oozing clay… Exactly 38 homes had disappeared and 31 people went with them. A photo showing the remaining town and the houses that were washed away is available [here](http://atlas.nrcan.gc.ca/site/english/maps/environment/naturalhazards/landslides/fig_22_land_vianney_aerial.jpg/image_view). The area was declared unfit for habitation, the residents were relocated, and the town shut down. ---
**Author:** ![GorillaMan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/50afbb/32.png) [@GorillaMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GorillaMan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 12:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/14 "2007-10-21T12:43:02Z")
Towns which have been washed away by the sea here - [Dunwich](http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=dunwich&sll=54.162434,-3.647461&sspn=9.142768,23.203125&ie=UTF8&ll=52.275734,1.634281&spn=0.009322,0.022659&t=k&z=16&om=1) (a major medieval port, now a few houses) and [Slaughden](http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&hl=en&geocode=&time=&date=&ttype=&q=aldeburgh&sll=54.162434,-3.647461&sspn=9.142768,23.203125&ie=UTF8&ll=52.141199,1.599519&spn=0.00935,0.022659&t=k&z=16&om=1) (never as big a place, but the satellite view shows how little remains of the land it once stood on, with just space for a boatyard). ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 1:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/15 "2007-10-21T13:10:40Z")
Several Tennessee towns, rather, their remains, have been found by TDOT during highway construction. Most were post-Civil War era, that dried up when slavery & King Cotton went belly up. At least one was Reconstruction era, & all black. Swallowed up by the woods, their very names have been forgotten. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 1:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/16 "2007-10-21T13:57:19Z")
Georgia has its share of ghost towns, and could stand to have quite a few more. Georgia is the most-governed state in the US, with 520-540 cities currently extant. A LOT of those cities are rural towns that wouldn’t make up a decent sized subdivision in Atlanta or Macon. I mean, we’re talking a convenience store, a stop light, and a couple of churches. A few years ago the Department of Community Affairs in Georgia tried to get rid of those towns that didn’t really provide any services to their citizens, but were just hanging on to collect state grants and generate tax and fee income (like, speeding tickets) for the town’s city council and their buddies, which was pretty much the whole town if you get my drift. They managed to get a few towns closed down, but quite a few managed to hang on because the rural city councilmembers lobbied the state legislature hard to make sure that the standards for remaining a town in Georgia were lax. And they were … very lax indeed. You could formally set up a deal where the county provided services to your town, and then claim you were providing those services, even though it was all basically coming from the county. Having a town council that met regularly was considered a service. You get the picture. Anyways, here’s a site with some actual ghost towns listed. Some of the listing are of towns that are far from defunct, like Dahlonega, but have something ghost-townish to them. Still, some interesting shots of ruined towns here … > **[Ghost Towns of Georgia](http://www.ghosttowns.com/states/ga/ga.html)** > > Ghosttowns.com-the best source of > information on ghost towns in the U.S. Ghost towns are listed by > state & include biographies, pictures, and other > detailed ghost town info. ---
**Author:** ![DudleyGarrett](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d9b06d/32.png) [@DudleyGarrett](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DudleyGarrett)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/17 "2007-10-21T14:52:33Z")
Great stuff, guys. Thanks for the posts. So far a lot of fascinating and unfortunate stories… ---
**Author:** ![Rayne\_Man](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/df705f/32.png) [@Rayne\_Man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rayne_Man)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 3:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/18 "2007-10-21T15:26:22Z")
There is a website devoted to this subject here :- [Abandoned Communities](http://www.abandonedcommunities.co.uk/places.html) ---
**Author:** ![Maastricht](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/a88e57/32.png) [@Maastricht](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maastricht)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/19 "2007-10-21T15:34:16Z")
How about [Chernobyl?](http://www.kiddofspeed.com/chapter1.html). The link is a series of photo’s and descriptions by a young woman who toured Chernobyl and vincinity last year on her motorbike. Using a geigerteller to keep clear of areas’s that were still too radioactive, she manged to do a sort-of-safe tour. For instance, here’s her caption beneath pictures of a series of [desolate](http://www.kiddofspeed.com/chapter12.html) apartment blocks with trees growing through the concrete: > [@](#): > > At first glance, Ghost Town seems like a normal town. There is a taxi stop, a grocery store, someone’s wash hangs from the balcony and the windows are open. > But then I see a slogan on a building that says - “The Party of Lenin Will Lead Us To The Triumph Of Communism”…and I realize that those windows were opened to the sping air of April of 1986. > There are many places that not structurally safe, or have collected pockets of intense radiation. There are places where no one dares to go, not even scientists with protective gear. One such place is the Red Wood forest and another is the Ghost Town Cemetary. The relatives of the people who are buried there can not visit, because in addition to people, much of the radioctive graphite nuclear core is buried there. It is one of the most toxic places on earth. ---
**Author:** ![Baron\_Greenback](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/baron_greenback/32/48_2.png) [@Baron\_Greenback](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Baron_Greenback)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2007, 3:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427/20 "2007-10-21T15:36:05Z")
Quite a well-known one in Scotland (maybe the whole UK) is the entire island group of St. Kilda, out in the North Atlantic. It was finally abandoned by the last of the native inhabitants (after about 4000 years!) in 1930. It’s now a World Heritage Site and has an interesting website[here.](http://www.kilda.org.uk/) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/defunct-towns/423427.md?page=2)