Abandoned Towns
Tip Top about 1888: wooden buildings along a desert canyon below a mine dump, with the stamp mill and its tall stack at right

Silver mining town

Tip Top

A silver camp in a desert canyon west of Black Canyon City whose mine produced about $2.2 million in silver and gold between 1875 and 1883. The road was gated in 2018–2019, and a 2024 trip report says the mine is still closed to the public.

34°03′03″N 112°14′49″W · ≈2,500 ft

Photo: Unknown author, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

Closed · 2024 report

The Tip Top Mine is on patented, privately owned claims. A gate went up near the townsite in November 2018, and in 2019 the mine owner closed access after vandalism. A trip report posted in July 2024 says it was still closed. Don't pass the gate, and ask the BLM Hassayampa Field Office about the approach trail before you go.

Overview

A silver camp in a desert canyon

The south end about 1888, with the stamp mill and its stack
The south end about 1888, with the stamp mill and its stack · Photo: Unknown author, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

Tip Top sits in a steep canyon in the southern foothills of the Bradshaw Mountains, about six miles west-southwest of Black Canyon City. Jack Moore and Bill Corning found a rich silver lode here in 1875, and a camp grew up around the mine the next year. The first ore went nine miles to a mill on the Agua Fria River, and the town of Gillett grew up around the mill.

The mine's main run lasted from 1875 to 1883, and USGS records value its silver and gold output for those years at $2.2 million. Tip Top got a post office in 1880, and photographs from about 1888 show a stamp mill, an assay office, a brewery and beer hall, a restaurant, a saloon and a hotel strung along the canyon road. Accounts of the peak population run from about 500 to 1,200. By 1890 it was 65.

The post office closed in 1895. Miners came back for tungsten during World War I, in 1928 and from 1936, mostly reworking the old dumps, and the last recorded production was in 1942. The mine sits on patented, privately owned claims. A gate went up near the townsite in 2018, and in 2019 the owner closed access after vandalism. Visitors before then described stone foundations, mine dumps, a headframe and a corral.

Timeline

Silver, tungsten and a locked gate

  1. Jack Moore and Bill Corning find a rich silver lode in the southern foothills of the Bradshaw Mountains.
  2. A camp grows up around the mine and the Tip Top district is organized.
  3. A post office opens at Gillett, the mill town on the Agua Fria River nine miles away, named for the mine's developer, Dan B. Gillett.
  4. The mine's main run. USGS records value its silver and gold output at $2.2 million.
  5. Tip Top gets its own post office.
  6. Photographs show a stamp mill, an assay office, a brewery, a beer hall, a restaurant, a saloon and a hotel along the canyon.
  7. The population is 65.
  8. The post office closes.
  9. Henry Volney Wager dies when his pick strikes a buried case of dynamite. He is buried at Tip Top.
  10. Small amounts of tungsten are recovered, mostly from the old dumps, during World War I, in 1928 and from 1936. The last recorded production is in 1942.
  11. A gate goes up near the townsite.
  12. The mine owner reports vandalism and closes access. Trail guides mark the route closed.
  13. A visitor on the old trail writes that the mine is still closed to the public.

Legend and record

Big numbers and campfire stories

The output. Popular accounts credit Tip Top's mines with more than $4 million. The USGS Mineral Resources Data System, citing Arizona Bureau of Mines figures, values the main 1875–1883 run at $2.2 million, plus small tungsten output later. We use the USGS number.

The population. Wikipedia says the town passed 500 at its peak; a 2023 travel article says 1,200. The only dated figure we found is 65, in 1890. We give the range.

The brewery. The 1888 photograph labels a brewery and beer hall, and one trail guide calls the foundations by the trail entrance the remains of Arizona's first brewery. We found no record to support that title.

The cemetery list, compiled in 2006 from one informant's account, gives causes of death that sound like campfire stories: two men killed in gunfights, one struck by lightning, one bitten by a centipede while pulling on his boots. None of the graves is marked. Treat them as local tradition.

What's left

Foundations, dumps and three burial grounds

A roofless stone building below the tailings
A roofless stone building below the tailings · Photo: Gold Guru, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
A corral of heavy timbers
A corral of heavy timbers · Photo: Gold Guru, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

Before the gate, visitors found stone foundations along the road and scattered up the canyon slopes, with the main mine still closed by its door. A 2019 trail guide describes a headframe and a fenced shaft up a rough side trail just before the townsite, and the Seventy-Six Mine less than a mile up the creek. Photos by Rod Fitzhugh, posted to Wikipedia around 2007, show a roofless stone building below the tailings and a corral of heavy timbers.

Researchers from the Arizona Pioneer & Cemetery Research Project mapped three burial sites in 2006 and 2007: three miners' graves at the southeast end of town, a man, a young man and a woman on the hill along the road up to the headframe, and a cemetery of about 21 graves, several of them children's, on the south bank of Cottonwood Creek below the Seventy-Six Mine. They found no headstones, only stacked rock.

The historic maps below show the name come and go. The 1887 sheet marks Tip Top with building symbols in Boulder Cañon, and the 1903 sheet spells it Tiptop, with a trail running west past Swilling Gulch. The 1954 sheet drops the name. The 1969 Black Canyon City sheet marks the Tiptop Mine and a well beside the creek road.

  • Stone foundations along the road
  • Brewery foundations (by tradition)
  • Mine dumps and tailings
  • Headframe and fenced shaft
  • Timber corral
  • Three burial sites, about 27 graves, none marked
  • Seventy-Six Mine, upstream
USGS topographic map of the Tip Top area with a jeep track following a creek through steep hills
USGS The National Map, topo. A jeep track follows the creek through the townsite; the square at upper left is a building symbol near the old mine.
Aerial view of a desert canyon with tracks along the creek and pale clearings on the slope above
Aerial imagery, same area. Tracks follow the creek bed, with pale dumps and clearings on the slope above it.

Historic maps

Tip Top on USGS maps, 1887–1981

Crops from the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection, centered on the townsite. Each sheet shows what surveyors mapped that year; compare them with today's topo and aerial on this page.

USGS topographic map around Tip Top, 1887
Prescott sheet, 1887, 1:250,000 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Map & directions

Getting there

Black Canyon City is the nearest town. The route below follows the old Tip Top Mine trail through the Table Mesa off-highway area, starting at I-17 exit 236. It's a high-clearance, four-wheel-drive trail, and it was gated just short of the townsite in 2018–2019. We show it so you can see where Tip Top lies, not as a way past the gate.

USGS topographic map from Black Canyon City and I-17 west to Tip Top, with the old trail drawn on it

Base map: USGS The National Map (public domain). Routes: OSRM on © OpenStreetMap contributors data (ODbL), computed October 2026. Times assume dry roads.

From Black Canyon City20.2 miabout 1 h 40 min
  1. From Black Canyon City, take Old Black Canyon Highway south to I-17.2.3 mi
  2. Drive south on I-17 and take exit 236, Table Mesa Road.5.5 mi
  3. Head west on Table Mesa Road, then follow unnamed off-highway routes north toward the Gillett area.4.7 mi
  4. Turn right onto an unnamed track and head west into the hills.4.6 mi
  5. Turn left, then right onto the track up to the townsite. A gate stood near the townsite in 2019.3.0 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • Trail guides rate the Tip Top Mine trail moderate and call high clearance and four-wheel drive a must. Expect steep, rocky descents near Tip Top and a washout around mile 7 that troubles long-wheelbase vehicles.
  • The trail has water crossings and a sandy wash whose condition changes with every storm. Don't cross running water.
  • The first staging area off Table Mesa Road is on Arizona State Trust land and needs a permit. Gillett and parts of the trail beyond it are private property. Respect posted signs.
  • In 2019 FunTreks asked visitors not to go past the water crossing at its waypoint 5. For the trail's current state, call the BLM Hassayampa Field Office at 623-580-5500.
  • Summer heat is severe at 2,500 feet. Go between fall and spring, carry plenty of water and stay out of mine openings.

Photos

Tip Top in photos

Visitor reports

Been to Tip Top?

Been there lately? Tell the next visitor what you found: whether you could get in, the state of the road and what's still standing. Photos are welcome. We read every report before it appears here.

Silver mining

More silver mining ghost towns

The nearest in Arizona.

Map around Bradshaw CityGuide

Bradshaw City

34.20, -112.36

Yavapai County, Arizona

A silver camp laid out in 1871 on the mountain above the Tiger Mine, two miles from Crown King. It was empty by 1896. Foundations, a Forest Service…

Ruins · 2005 reportSilver mining
Map around HooperGuide

Hooper

34.27, -112.38

Yavapai County, Arizona

A mining camp on the Senator Highway with a post office from 1899 to 1916, successor to an 1880s camp called Meesville nearby. Nothing is reported…

Site only · unverifiedSilver mining

All 69 silver mining ghost towns →

Nearby

Other sites near Tip Top

Straight-line distance from the townsite to other mapped sites in our Arizona index.

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "Tip Top": fact sheet fields (roads, legal description, climate, best time, remains, post office dates, discoverers).
  2. Wikipedia, "Tip Top, Arizona", retrieved October 2026: coordinates (GNIS), settlement date, post office dates, the 500 and 65 population figures.
  3. Wikipedia, "Gillett, Arizona": the mill town, its distance from Tip Top, its 1878 post office and the Gillett name.
  4. USGS Mineral Resources Data System, "Tip Top Mine" (record 10109015): discovery, the $2.2 million output, tungsten, last production, patented claims, location.
  5. Arizona Pioneer & Cemetery Research Project, "Tip Top Cemeteries" (archived copy, 2006–07): the three burial sites, the Wager death and the recorded causes of death.
  6. azoffroad.net, "Tip Top Mine Trail" (updated April 2019): the gate and closure, trail rating and vehicle needs, staging permit, remains, private land at Gillett.
  7. FunTreks, "Tip Top Mine" (update of July 28, 2019): the owner's closure after vandalism, waypoint 5, BLM contact.
  8. Destination4x4, "Tip Top Arizona," June 2023: the $4 million and 1,200 claims, the trail still closed.
  9. JL Wrangler Forums, "Table Mesa Road" trip report, posted July 2, 2024: the mine still closed to the public.
  10. Building identifications in the 1888 photographs: the Wikimedia Commons file descriptions, which cite James E. and Barbara H. Sherman, Ghost Towns of Arizona, p. 152.
  11. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits