Abandoned Towns
Iron-fenced family plots with white headstones and crosses at Dawson Cemetery, below a rocky, juniper-covered hillside

Coal mining town

Dawson

A Phelps Dodge coal town of about 6,000 people, where two explosions killed nearly 400 miners. The town is gone. Its cemetery, with rows of white iron crosses, is the only part open to the public.

36°39′51″N 104°46′29″W · ≈6,390 ft

Photo: Wallace Schultz, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

Cemetery only

The townsite is on a private ranch that The Nature Conservancy bought in December 2025. Only Dawson Cemetery is open to the public, per the Albuquerque Journal. Don't go past the cemetery onto ranch land.

Overview

A company town and its graves

Dawson's main street in 1916, with a brick block at left and a hotel at right
Dawson's main street in 1916, with a brick block at left and a hotel at right · Photo: Legends of America Archives, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain

Dawson began as a ranch. John Barkley Dawson settled on the Vermejo River in 1867, and in 1901 he sold his land to C.B. Eddy for $400,000. There was coal under it. In 1905 Eddy sold the mines and the railroad to Phelps Dodge, which needed coke for its copper smelters, and Dawson became a company town. By 1913 about 6,000 people lived there.

On October 22, 1913, an explosion tore through Stag Canyon Mine No. 2. Of the 286 men who went in that morning, 263 died. Ten years later, on February 8, 1923, an explosion in Mine No. 1 killed about 120 more; Wikipedia gives 123. The 1913 blast is the second-deadliest mine disaster in the country, per the Albuquerque Journal.

Phelps Dodge closed the mines in 1950, and by 1954 everyone had gone. Little of the town is left. The cemetery, with about 600 marked graves and white iron crosses for many of the miners, is on the National Register. The ranch around it changed hands in December 2025, when The Nature Conservancy bought it, and the cemetery remains the only public access.

Timeline

Ranch, coal town, cemetery

The coke works in 1920: smokestacks and long rows of ovens, with houses on the slope behind
The coke works in 1920: smokestacks and long rows of ovens, with houses on the slope behind · Photo: Legends of America Archives, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain
  1. John Barkley Dawson settles on the Vermejo River on more than 24,000 acres he bought from Lucien Maxwell.
  2. A court confirms Dawson's title, and he sells the land to C.B. Eddy for $400,000.
  3. Eddy sells the mines and railroad to Phelps Dodge, which wants the coal for coke.
  4. About 6,000 people live in Dawson.
  5. An explosion in Stag Canyon Mine No. 2 kills 263 of the 286 men who went to work that morning.
  6. An explosion in Stag Canyon Mine No. 1 kills 123 miners by Wikipedia's count. The Albuquerque Journal puts it at about 120.
  7. Phelps Dodge closes the mines.
  8. The last residents are gone and the post office has closed.
  9. Dawson Cemetery is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
  10. Colfax Land & Cattle Co. buys the land from Phelps Dodge.
  11. The Nature Conservancy completes its purchase of the 50,000-acre Dawson Elk Valley Ranch.

What's left

Dawson Cemetery

Iron-fenced family plots at Dawson Cemetery, 2018
Iron-fenced family plots at Dawson Cemetery, 2018 · Photo: Wallace Schultz, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0

The cemetery has about 600 marked graves in three sections, fenced with barbed wire or iron pipe. Many miners' graves carry white-painted iron crosses. The Dawson New Mexico Association, a Raton nonprofit, looks after it and holds reunions on the old townsite every other Labor Day weekend.

An undated listing says the remains are mainly the cemetery. Wikipedia says ruins can be reached by continuing north on A38, but that is ranch land, and the Albuquerque Journal says the cemetery is the only public access.

  • Dawson Cemetery (about 600 marked graves)
  • White iron crosses for mine victims
  • Scattered ruins on private ranch land
USGS topographic map of the Dawson Cemetery area on the Vermejo River
USGS The National Map, topo. The cemetery lies at the center of this crop, east of A38 and the rail line, with the Vermejo River to the west.
Aerial view of the Dawson Cemetery: pale fenced rectangles on open ground below wooded slopes
Aerial imagery, same area. The fenced cemetery sections show as pale rectangles at center; the road and rail line run down the valley at left.

Historic maps

Dawson on USGS maps, 1954–1987

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 Dawson, 1954
Raton sheet, 1954, 1:250,000 · U.S. Geological Survey, public domain · catalog record

Map & directions

Getting there

Cimarron is the nearest town. Wikipedia's directions: take US 64 about 12 miles east of Cimarron, turn north on A38 at the striped sign, go about 5 miles and turn right on the dirt road to the cemetery. The routes below end at the cemetery.

USGS topographic map between Cimarron and Dawson Cemetery with the route 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 Cimarron17.3 miabout 1 h 05 min
  1. From Cimarron, take US 64 east.12.5 mi
  2. Turn left (north) on A38.3.8 mi
  3. Turn right on the dirt road to the cemetery.0.9 mi
Google Maps directionsApple MapsOpenStreetMap

Road and safety notes

  • The last stretch to the cemetery is a dirt road; an undated listing rates the trip 2WD.
  • Only the cemetery is open to the public. The ranch around it is private conservation land; stay off it.
  • Snow is possible in winter.
  • The router treats A38 as a slow track, about 37 minutes for its 3.8 miles, so the drive times shown are probably long. We haven't confirmed the road's surface.

Photos

Dawson in photos

Visitor reports

Been to Dawson?

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.

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Nearby

Other sites near Dawson

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

Sources

Sources and credits

  1. ghosttowns.com, "Dawson": fact sheet fields (road, climate, best time, remains).
  2. Wikipedia, "Dawson, New Mexico", retrieved October 2026: John Dawson, the Eddy and Phelps Dodge sales, 1913 population, both explosions, 1950 closure, 1954 abandonment, directions.
  3. Wikipedia, "Dawson Cemetery", retrieved October 2026: coordinates, National Register date, about 600 marked graves in three sections, barbed wire and iron pipe fences.
  4. Albuquerque Journal, "Nature Conservancy acquires New Mexico ranch once the site of historic coal town," December 28, 2025: the December 15 closing, 50,000 acres, the 2002 sale by Phelps Dodge, the cemetery as the only public access, the Dawson New Mexico Association and its reunions, second-deadliest mine disaster, about 120 killed in 1923.
  5. Elevation: USGS 3D Elevation Program point query. Routes: OSRM on OpenStreetMap data, October 2026. Not field-checked.

Photo and map credits