Abandoned 
Gold mining 
Mill, lumber and company Check the status first
Ghost towns change hands and close. Ruby, one of Arizona's best preserved, shut its gate to the public in June 2024. Every town page here shows a status line and the date we last checked it.
38°12′44″N 119°00′44″W · Bodie, California
Abandoned towns of America
Mining camps, rail stops and boomtowns, with what's still standing, how to get there, and whether you're allowed in.
Photo: Bodie, California, King of Hearts, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
The Mother Road
Ghost towns along Route 66
Take the old road through bypassed towns, roadside stops and desert settlements. Explore 26 town guides, with a route map and a westbound road log from Illinois to California.
Explore Route 66 ghost towns →
Town guides
Start with a town guide
Eight of our most-read guides: history, what's left, current access, photos, maps and directions.
GuideCentralia
40.80, -76.34Columbia County, Pennsylvania
A coal borough of more than 2,000 people, emptied by a mine fire that has burned beneath it since 1962. A street grid, a few houses, a church and…
Five residentsCoal mining
GuideCairo
37.01, -89.18Alexander County, Illinois
Cairo grew rich on the rivers and the railroad, peaked at 15,203 people in 1920 and has lost people in every census since 1950. About 1,700 live…
Living town · 1,733 (2020)River and lake
GuideMonowi
42.83, -98.33Boyd County, Nebraska
A railroad village platted in 1902 that counted 123 people in 1930 and one in 2010. Elsie Eiler, its only resident, runs the tavern and the library…
Population oneRailroad and road
GuideTombstone
31.71, -110.07Cochise County, Arizona
Arizona's richest silver district and the scene of the 1881 gunfight near the O.K. Corral. The mines flooded and the census count fell to 646 by…
Living townSilver mining
North and South Brother Islands
40.80, -73.90Bronx County, New York
A former quarantine hospital in the East River between the Bronx and Rikers Island, empty since the mid-1960s and closed to the public. Neighboring…
Closed
GuidePicher
36.98, -94.83Ottawa County, Oklahoma
The richest field in the Tri-State lead and zinc district built a town of more than 14,000 people. Mining left the ground undermined and the water…
Superfund siteOther mining and oil
GuideDudleytown
41.81, -73.35Litchfield County, Connecticut
A 1740s cluster of hill farms southeast of Cornwall Bridge that emptied as farming declined, and that a 20th-century curse story turned into a…
PrivateFarm and ranch
GuideBisbee
31.45, -109.93Cochise County, Arizona
One of the West's great copper camps, with about 9,000 people by 1910 and the county seat since 1929. The mines closed in 1975, and the town lived on…
Living townCopper mining
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America's ghost towns in 30 seconds
Discover former mining camps and railroad towns, explore history and photographs, and check maps and access notes before you go.
Browse by state
Start with a state
Each state hub maps every known site, county by county, with drive times from the nearest cities. Hubs are live for Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming. Every other site has its own page; search finds all 6,591.
- Alabama 64
- Alaska 61
- Arizona 397
- Arkansas 57
- California 410
- Colorado 388
- Connecticut 12
- Delaware 8
- Florida 253
- Georgia 83
- Hawaii 22
- Idaho 96
- Illinois 87
- Indiana 55
- Iowa 82
- Kansas 184
- Kentucky 30
- Louisiana 31
- Maine 7
- Maryland 22
- Massachusetts 18
- Michigan 99
- Minnesota 66
- Mississippi 38
- Missouri 313
- Montana 102
- Nebraska 101
- Nevada 646
- New Hampshire 5
- New Jersey 39
- New Mexico 587
- New York 26
- North Carolina 23
- North Dakota 88
- Ohio 100
- Oklahoma 259
- Oregon 141
- Pennsylvania 63
- Rhode Island 3
- South Carolina 19
- South Dakota 150
- Tennessee 28
- Texas 654
- Utah 195
- Vermont 7
- Virginia 21
- Washington 178
- West Virginia 112
- Wisconsin 77
- Wyoming 84
Near a city
Ghost towns near the biggest cities
Ghost towns within a three-hour drive of the ten largest US cities, nearest first, with drive times and what's left. All city pages.
Featured
Ten towns worth the drive
Parks, public land and one place you can no longer enter. Cards marked Guide open the town's full guide.
Bodie
38.21, -119.01Mono County, California
Gold boomtown of 1876 at 8,379 feet. About 8,000 people by 1879, a ghost town by 1915.
State historic park
Rhyolite
36.90, -116.83Nye County, Nevada
1905 gold-rush town in the Bullfrog Hills, at the edge of Death Valley National Park.
Public land
Kennecott
61.52, -142.84Copper River, Alaska
Copper mill town beside the Kennicott Glacier, run by the National Park Service.
National park
Bannack
45.16, -113.00Beaverhead County, Montana
Founded in 1862 on Grasshopper Creek and kept as Bannack State Park.
State park
Garnet
46.83, -113.34Granite County, Montana
1890s gold town whose surviving buildings are cared for by the Bureau of Land Management.
Public land
Animas Forks
37.93, -107.57San Juan County, Colorado
One of North America's highest mining camps, at 11,185 feet above Silverton.
Public land
St. Elmo
38.70, -106.34Chaffee County, Colorado
1880 gold and silver camp at 9,961 feet in the Sawatch Range. The railroad quit in 1922.
Partly inhabited
Grafton
37.17, -113.08Washington County, Utah
Farming town just south of Zion, often called the most photographed ghost town in the West.
Open to visitors
Calico
34.95, -116.86San Bernardino County, California
1881 silver town off I-15 near Barstow, now a regional park.
County park
Ruby
31.46, -111.24Santa Cruz County, Arizona
Border-country mining camp with two dozen standing buildings, closed to visitors since June 2024.
Closed since 2024
Field guide
Before you go
Stay out of shafts and tunnels
Old mine openings can drop hundreds of feet, with rotten timbers and bad air. Look from outside. The federal mine-safety slogan says it plainly: stay out, stay alive.
Leave it as you found it
Taking artifacts from federal land can break the Archaeological Resources Protection Act, and on private land it's theft. Photograph the bottles and square nails; leave them where they lie.
Photo credits
- Kennecott: Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
- Animas Forks: Int77345, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Rhyolite: Tahoenathan, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Kelly: Forssa01, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
- Thurmond: Bestbudbrian, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Hackberry: G. Edward Johnson, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
- Centralia: Reelcheeper, Wikimedia Commons, CC0
- Cairo: hickory hardscrabble, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
- Monowi: Andrew Filer from Seattle (ex-Minneapolis), Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
- Tombstone: Packbj, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- North and South Brother Islands: RoySmith, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Picher: formulanone, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
- Bisbee: Nicholas Hartmann, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Bodie: King of Hearts, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Rhyolite: Tahoenathan, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
- Kennecott: Sewtex, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.5
- Bannack: Mark Holloway from Anaconda, Montana, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
- Garnet: Rhododendrites, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
- Animas Forks: Kimon Berlin, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0
- St. Elmo: Rolf Blauert Dk4hb, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
- Grafton: Triberocker, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
- Calico: Alexander Mason, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0
- Ruby: PhilipC at Flickr, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0