State hubs
50 states have a hub with a map and every known site: 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. The others are greyed out until their hub is ready. Every site in all 50 states still has its own page, and the search box finds them.
State hub · Pennsylvania
Pennsylvania's ghost towns are company towns that outlived their company. The anthracite fields of the northeast, with the largest known hard-coal deposits in the world, were worked from patch towns like Eckley, Concrete City and Centralia; deep mining collapsed after the 1959 Knox Mine disaster and ended in the mid-1960s, and the Centralia mine fire has burned since 1962. Bituminous coal and coke built dozens of patches in the west, strung along what is now the Ghost Town Trail in Indiana and Cambria counties. Edwin Drake's 1859 strike at Titusville started America's first oil rush, which made Pithole a city of 15,000 to 20,000 people in 1865 and a ghost town by 1877. Lumber towns like Laquin and Ricketts cut themselves out of work when the forests were gone, and a few places, among them Kinzua, Livermore and Aitch, disappeared under reservoirs.
Most of what survives is in the woods: stone foundations and a cemetery at Rausch Gap, a graffiti-covered ore washer at Scotia, 149 concrete munitions bunkers where Alvira stood. The exceptions are the preserved sites, Eckley Miners' Village and Pithole, both run by the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission, and Frick's Lock, a canal village owned by its township and stabilized by the power company next door. Many sites are on State Game Lands, open to walkers under Game Commission rules, and many more are on private land.
Town guides
Our complete guides, most-read first: history, what's left, current access, photos, maps and directions.
GuideColumbia County
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…
GuideLuzerne County
A model village of poured-concrete double houses that a railroad built for its miners in 1911. It was empty by 1924, and the buildings proved too…
GuideVenango County
An oil boomtown laid out in May 1865 that held 15,000 people by fall and was nearly empty by 1870. Pennsylvania keeps the mowed street grid as a…
GuideChester County
A canal village around a farmhouse from the 1750s, bought out for a nuclear plant and empty since the 1980s. Its buildings now stand across the river…
GuideCentre County
Andrew Carnegie built this iron-ore town in the pine barrens in 1880 and sold it in 1899. The mines closed in 1911. The remains lie on public game…
GuideLebanon County
A coal and railroad town of about 1,000 people in 1860, abandoned by 1910. Its foundations and a small cemetery lie in the woods where the…
GuideUnion County
A farm village of about a hundred people, taken by the government in 1942 and razed for a TNT plant that closed within a year or so. What is left…
Sullivan County
A small religious village on the plateau west of Laporte, where Peter Armstrong waited for the Second Coming and deeded his land to God. It was…
Watch
Coal patch houses, oil boom streets, and an old canal village. Explore the history, maps and access notes before you go.
Where to start
Open attractions, living towns and true ruins, with their current status.
Columbia County
Anthracite borough emptied by a mine fire burning since 1962. The state condemned it in 1992, and five people lived there at the 2020 census. The DEP strongly discourages visits to the fire area; the Graffiti Highway was buried in 2020.
Luzerne County
Coal patch town begun in 1854 near Hazleton, saved by the filming of The Molly Maguires and run as Eckley Miners' Village by the state since 1970. The village is free to walk or drive through from dawn to dusk; museum admission is $8 for adults, and the houses and churches are closed from Labor Day to Memorial Day.
Venango County
Oil boomtown laid out in May 1865 that held 15,000 to 20,000 people by the end of the year and 237 by 1870. Mowed streets, cellar holes and a visitor center with a diorama of the town, run by the state with the Friends of Drake Well. Grounds open dawn to dusk year-round, free; the visitor center opens on summer weekends.
Lebanon County
Coal and railroad town of about 1,000 people in 1860, torn down by the railroad around 1883. Stone foundations and a small cemetery on State Game Lands 211, reached on foot on the Stony Valley rail-trail or the Appalachian Trail. Bikes are barred from October 1 to January 31 and April 20 to May 31 unless you are hunting.
Chester County
Village named for Schuylkill Navigation locks of the early 1820s, emptied when the Limerick nuclear plant was built across the river. East Coventry Township has owned it since 2011 and runs free escorted tours on set Saturdays (the last of 2026 on October 24); it describes the village as open for escorted public access.
Luzerne County
Twenty to twenty-two concrete duplexes built in 1911 for Delaware, Lackawanna and Western coal employees at Nanticoke. The Glen Alden Coal Company would not pay for required improvements, could not demolish the solid houses and abandoned them in 1924. A 2019 visitor saw no No Trespassing signs and, per county tax records, placed them on City of Nanticoke land; visiting rules unconfirmed.
Centre County
Andrew Carnegie's iron-ore town in the pine barrens west of State College, worked from 1880 until the mines closed in 1911. The concrete ore-washer ruins, partly under graffiti, sit in State Game Lands 176 (Centre County History, June 2024), open to walkers under Game Commission rules; wear orange in hunting seasons.
Union County
Farm village whose people were told in March 1942 to leave for a War Department TNT plant that ran about 11 months. Some 149 earth-covered bunkers and three cemeteries remain on State Game Lands 252 near Allenwood, some beside Alvira Road (Islands, September 2025).
Sullivan County
Millennialist colony founded in the 1850s by Peter Armstrong, who deeded the land to God; the county sold it for unpaid taxes. Its foundations, 1.5 miles west of Laporte on Route 42, are marked to follow the Sullivan County Historical Society's brochure. Its undated page says the site can be visited year-round; we found no dated report.
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 Pennsylvania index, with its county. A ◦ marks sites already on the map.
No sites match. Try fewer letters or another county.
Plan a trip
Rausch Gap, Scotia, Alvira and many smaller sites lie on State Game Lands, which are open to walkers but managed for hunting. Game Commission rules require anyone not hunting to wear 250 square inches of fluorescent orange from October 1 to January 31 and April 20 to May 31, and bar bicycles and horses in those periods; riding is allowed only on roads open to public travel or posted routes. Camping and the removal of any object, including historical and archaeological artifacts, are banned without permission, and so are drones. Plan to walk in.
Pennsylvania's abandoned mines are the main hazard. At Centralia the DEP warns that the ground over the fire is prone to sudden collapse and strongly discourages visiting the fire area, where signs warn of carbon monoxide. Elsewhere, stay out of shafts, drift mouths and the open Alvira bunkers, and treat any sunken ground near an old patch town as a possible subsidence.
Several of these towns are not quite empty. Centralia's few homes are private and lived in, Concrete City's owner has not stated any visiting rules, and Frick's Lock is opened only for escorted tours on set days. Celestia's parking is on private land. The coal patches and lumber camps on company or farm land need the owner's permission.
The preserved sites keep short seasons: Eckley's buildings close from Labor Day to Memorial Day, Pithole's visitor center opens only on summer weekends, June to August, and Frick's Lock's 2026 tours ran from April to October. Game lands stay open year-round, and their ruins are easiest to find in winter and early spring, before the undergrowth hides the foundations; summer brings ticks and poison ivy.
FAQ
Hundreds, if you count every coal patch, lumber camp and oil town. Wikipedia's openly incomplete list runs to well over a hundred names. Our index lists 63 sites; 33 of them have coordinates on our map so far, and 30 still lack a county.
For a day out, Eckley Miners' Village: a whole anthracite patch town preserved by the state, with a museum, churches and miners' houses you can walk past for free. For atmosphere, Centralia, though the state asks you to stay away from the fire area and the town is now mostly overgrowth. For a walk in the woods, Rausch Gap on the Appalachian Trail.
You can drive the public roads, and five people still live there. The Department of Environmental Protection strongly discourages anyone from visiting the immediate fire area, where the ground is prone to sudden collapse and dangerous gases are present; signs warn of carbon monoxide. The Graffiti Highway, the abandoned stretch of Route 61, was buried under dirt in April 2020.
From Philadelphia, Port Kennedy in Valley Forge park is about 35 minutes away and Frick's Lock near Pottstown about an hour. From Pittsburgh, West Overton and the Livermore site on the Conemaugh are about an hour, and Wehrum on the Ghost Town Trail a little over an hour and a half. These are routed estimates; most sites end with a walk.
Not on State Game Lands, where camping is unlawful without permission, so Rausch Gap, Scotia and Alvira are day trips. The exception is for Appalachian Trail through-hikers, who may camp one night within 200 feet of the trail; Rausch Gap has an AT shelter. Oil Creek State Park, whose office is on Petroleum Center Road, has two hike-in shelter areas on its Gerard Hiking Trail, with a fee and reservations required.
Abandoned