State hubs
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State hub · California
California's ghost towns trace a run of booms. Gold found at Sutter's Mill in Coloma in January 1848 brought about 300,000 people to California by 1855, and the camps they built line the Sierra Nevada foothills along Highway 49, the Golden Chain Highway. Later strikes moved east of the Sierra and into the Mojave: silver at Cerro Gordo in 1865, a gold boom at Bodie in the late 1870s, silver at Calico in 1881 and gold at Randsburg in 1895. The state also has coal towns below Mount Diablo, railroad water stops that became Route 66 towns, a socialist colony at Llano del Rio and Leadfield, a 1920s stock-promotion camp in Death Valley. Other towns were drowned by reservoirs or bypassed by new rail lines and highways.
The sites cluster in two belts: the Gold Country foothills, and the deserts east of the Sierra, where Inyo County, which takes in Death Valley and the Owens Valley, has more sites in our index than any other county. What survives varies a lot. Bodie keeps about 110 buildings in arrested decay as a state historic park, and Columbia and North Bloomfield are state parks too. Calico was largely rebuilt in the 1950s. Many Gold Rush camps grew into small living towns, while many desert camps are down to foundations, mine dumps and a cemetery.
Town guides
Our complete guides, most-read first: history, what's left, current access, photos, maps and directions.
GuideMono County
A gold camp that held 5,417 people at the 1880 census and lost them all by 1950. About 110 buildings still stand in arrested decay, kept as they were…
GuideRiverside County
Kaiser Steel built this town for its iron mine in 1948, and about 4,000 people lived in it. The mine closed in 1983, and the streets of postwar…
GuideSan Diego County
A gold rush boomtown of the 1870s in the mountains east of San Diego. Julian never emptied. It turned to apples and visitors, and its old Main Street…
GuideSan Bernardino County
A silver camp of the 1880s in the striped Calico Mountains. Walter Knott bought it in 1951 and rebuilt it, and it has been a county park since 1966…
GuideInyo County
In 1869 this camp high in the Inyo Mountains led the country in silver and lead, and its bullion helped build early Los Angeles. It's privately owned…
GuideInyo County
A silver and lead camp of 1874 that a new highway bypassed in 1937. About 30 people still live here, and they'd like you to know it isn't a ghost…
GuideTuolumne County
Columbia preserves brick storefronts, a schoolhouse and working shops in the southern mines. The historic park is part of a living community.
GuideKern County
Gold at the Yellow Aster in 1895 drew more than 1,500 people to Randsburg within two years. The mine worked off and on until 2006. Forty-five people…
GuideLos Angeles County
In 1914 a socialist lawyer from Los Angeles founded a cooperative colony in the desert. It grew to about a thousand people, ran short of water and…
GuideInyo County
A supply town for the Panamint Range mines that held about 500 people in 1898 and was nearly empty by 1917. A prospector called Seldom Seen Slim…
GuideSan Bernardino County
A railroad town that died twice: once when its mines and railroads quit, and again when I-40 replaced Route 66. A few people still run the gas…
GuideLos Angeles County
California's oil industry started in this canyon in 1876. The company town that grew around the well emptied in the 1930s, and its superintendent's…
GuideSan Bernardino County
A railroad summit town that lost Route 66 in 1931. Little is left but its 1914 schoolhouse, restored as a free museum with outdoor exhibits that open…
GuideSan Bernardino County
Settlers from New Mexico founded Agua Mansa on the Santa Ana River in the 1840s. The flood of 1862 destroyed the town. Its cemetery survives, with a…
GuideSan Bernardino County
In 1860 gold in Holcomb Valley drew nearly 1,500 people to Belleville, high in the San Bernardino Mountains. It nearly became the county seat. A…
GuideKern County
A water stop called Cow Wells that became a mill town when Eugene Garlock hauled in a stamp mill for the Randsburg gold rush. Water piped to…
GuideContra Costa County
Somersville once served mines in the Mount Diablo coalfield. The townsite and Rose Hill Cemetery lie within Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve.
GuideInyo County
Leadfield’s 1920s boom left sheds and mine remains. The road through Titus Canyon is closed for flood repairs, including to hikers and cyclists.
GuideNevada County
A gold camp first called Humbug that grew to about 2,000 people around the biggest hydraulic mine in California. The 1884 Sawyer decision shut the…
Watch
Gold Rush camps, desert silver mines, and the streets they left behind. Explore the history, maps and access notes before you go.
Where to start
Open attractions, living towns and true ruins, with their current status.
Mono County
Gold boomtown of about 8,000 people around 1879, now a state historic park with about 110 buildings in arrested decay. Open all year, but in winter it can be reached only on skis, snowshoes or snowmobiles.
San Bernardino County
1881 silver camp off I-15 near Barstow, largely rebuilt after Walter Knott bought it in 1951. Now a San Bernardino County regional park, open daily from 9 to 5.
Tuolumne County
Gold Rush town founded in 1850 whose surviving historic buildings became Columbia State Historic Park in 1945. Free to enter, with exhibits and shops open daily.
Nevada County
Hydraulic-mining town of about 2,000 people in 1876, now inside Malakoff Diggins State Historic Park. Several original buildings survive beside the diggings of what was California's largest hydraulic gold mine.
Inyo County
1865 silver and lead camp in the Inyo Mountains above Owens Lake, privately owned since 2018 and being restored. Open daily from 9 to 5 at no charge; 8 miles of dirt road, 4WD recommended.
Kern County
Gold camp that grew up around the Yellow Aster mine after 1895, on US 395 south of Ridgecrest. 45 residents at the 2020 census; most shops open only on weekends.
Inyo County
Lead camp of 1925 and 1926 in Death Valley's Titus Canyon, sold to investors with misleading ads. A few sheds remain. The one-way Titus Canyon Road is closed, with reopening expected in May 2027.
Los Angeles County
Socialist colony founded in 1914 in the Antelope Valley that grew to about 1,000 members, then moved to Louisiana in 1917 and 1918. Stone ruins stand beside Highway 138.
Contra Costa County
One of five coal towns that worked the hills below Mount Diablo from the 1860s to about 1900, now in Black Diamond Mines Regional Preserve. Rose Hill Cemetery and weekend mine walks.
Near a city
Driving distance and time from downtown, routed over OpenStreetMap roads. Dirt roads are usually slower than the estimate.
Directory
Every town, camp and settlement in our California index, with its county. A ◦ marks sites already on the map.
No sites match. Try fewer letters or another county.
Plan a trip
Low desert sites are for October to April. In Death Valley summer highs often top 120°F in the shade. High camps work the other way: Bodie, at 8,375 feet, stays open all winter, but then it can be reached only on skis, snowshoes or snowmobiles. The Gold Country foothills can be visited all year.
Ghost town roads change with storms. Death Valley's Titus Canyon Road, the only drive to Leadfield, is closed for repairs, and the park expects to reopen it in May 2027. Cerro Gordo is up 8 miles of dirt, and the owners recommend 4WD. For North Bloomfield, State Parks says to stay on the paved route via Tyler Foote Road, because GPS can send you down rough dirt roads. The last 3 miles to Bodie are unpaved.
Bodie, Columbia and Malakoff Diggins are state parks with their own hours; Bodie charges $8 per adult, Malakoff Diggins $10 per car, and Columbia is free. Calico is a county park, Somersville is in an East Bay regional preserve, and Cerro Gordo is private but open daily. Many Gold Rush towns are living communities with private homes, and Drawbridge, at the south end of San Francisco Bay, sits in a wildlife refuge closed to the public.
Digging up, taking or damaging historic features on California public land without permission is a misdemeanor with a fine of up to $10,000 and up to a year in jail. In national parks such as Death Valley, metal detectors are prohibited, and so is removing any historic object. Stay out of old mine openings: Calico's managers call the area's mines extremely hazardous.
FAQ
There is no official count. Our index lists 410 sites, including some county seats and small living towns our sources count as historic or semi-abandoned. Inyo County, which includes most of Death Valley, has the most.
Bodie is the usual answer. About 110 buildings stand in arrested decay at a state historic park, out of about 2,000 at its peak. Calico, the state's official silver rush ghost town, is easier to reach off I-15 but was largely rebuilt in the 1950s.
Mentryville, an 1870s oil town in Pico Canyon near Santa Clarita that is now a public park, is under an hour from downtown. The Llano del Rio ruins are about an hour and a half away, and Calico about two and a half hours. Kern County has closed Redrock–Randsburg Road, the shortcut from CA 14, since December 2025, so Randsburg is now about 3 h 25 min away by CA 14 and US 395. Garlock sits on Garlock Road, which the county lists as closed to through traffic.
Yes. Bodie State Historic Park is open all year, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. between November and May. At 8,375 feet it can be reached in winter only on skis, snowshoes or snowmobiles, and State Parks warns of sub-zero temperatures, strong winds and whiteouts.
Yes. Cerro Gordo is privately owned, but its owners welcome visitors every day from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at no charge and with no appointment. The town is at the top of an 8-mile dirt road above Keeler, and a 4WD vehicle is recommended.
Not as of October 2026. The National Park Service has closed the one-way section of Titus Canyon Road, which passes Leadfield, for repairs and expects to reopen it in May 2027. The two-way section at the canyon's west end closes from October 27, 2026 through December.
Abandoned