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State hub · Wyoming
Wyoming's ghost towns come from three waves. The Union Pacific crossed the territory in 1867 and 1868 and left a string of construction camps, forts and coal towns along its line: Bear River City, Fort Fred Steele, Sherman at the summit of the original grade, and Carbon, the state's first coal town, abandoned when the railroad moved its main line to Hanna in 1899 and the mines closed in 1902. Gold found at South Pass in 1867 built South Pass City, Atlantic City and Miner's Delight at the southern tip of the Wind River Range, and later strikes made short-lived camps at Kirwin in the Absarokas and in the copper district of the Sierra Madre, where Ed Haggarty's 1897 find fed a 16-mile aerial tramway to the Encampment smelter and camps like Battle and Rambler, near 10,000 feet on Battle Pass, were empty by about 1912. Coal camps such as Gebo and Cambria came and went with their mines, and the Cold War uranium boom built Jeffrey City in 1957 and emptied it after 1982.
The sites are spread across the southern half of the state, along I-80 and around South Pass, with a second cluster in the Big Horn Basin. What survives ranges from South Pass City, kept by the state with more than 30 historic buildings, and Miner's Delight's 17 log and rough-lumber buildings on BLM land, to Carbon, with foundations, mine ruins and a refurbished cemetery, and Kane, which lies under Bighorn Lake. Many sites are on private ranch land; the best ones to visit are the state historic sites and the camps on public land.
Town guides
Our complete guides, most-read first: history, what's left, current access, photos, maps and directions.
GuideFremont County
A uranium boomtown on the high plains that grew to more than 4,000 people in the late 1970s and lost nearly all of them after the mine closed in…
GuideFremont County
A gold camp of 1867 at the south end of the Wind River Range, where the territory's women first voted and held office. The state keeps the town and…
GuideFremont County
Gold on Rock Creek drew some 2,000 people to Atlantic City in its first boom, from 1868. The boom lasted barely five years; dredges and an iron mine…
GuideAlbany County
At the top of the first transcontinental railroad, trains changed engines in a town of several hundred people. The tracks moved south and Sherman…
GuidePark County
A gold and silver camp at the head of the Wood River, ringed by peaks near 12,000 feet. About 200 people lived here around 1905; an avalanche in 1907…
GuideSweetwater County
A stage stop of 1862 on the Overland Trail where the Union Pacific arrived in 1868, and a starting point for the road to the South Pass gold camps.…
GuideUinta County
A railroad tie camp and helper-engine stop on the first Union Pacific line, left behind when the Aspen Tunnel moved the tracks. Three of Moses…
GuidePlatte County
From 1899 to 1980 Sunrise was a company town of the Colorado Fuel and Iron Company, digging iron ore for the steel mills of Pueblo. It closed in…
GuideAlbany County
A railroad and cattle-shipping town platted in 1909 on the old Bosler Ranch, then a Lincoln Highway stop of nearly 300 people. Interstate 80 bypassed…
GuideHot Springs County
A coal camp of more than 2,000 people north of Thermopolis, whose mine held the nation's first federal coal lease. The mines closed in 1938 and the…
GuideCarbon County
The coal town that fueled the first Union Pacific trains across Wyoming. A fire in 1890 and a new main line through Hanna in 1899 finished it, and…
GuideCarbon County
An Army post built in 1868 to guard the Union Pacific bridge over the North Platte. After the soldiers left in 1886 it lived on as a tie, sheep and…
GuidePark County
From August 1942 to November 1945 the federal government held Japanese Americans behind barbed wire on this bench below Heart Mountain. At its peak…
Watch
Gold camps, weathered cabins, and stone charcoal kilns. Explore the history, maps and access notes before you go.
Where to start
Open attractions, living towns and true ruins, with their current status.
Fremont County
Gold camp of 1867 at 7,840 feet with more than 30 historic buildings and the Carissa Mine. Buildings open Memorial Day to mid-October; the grounds and trails are open year-round. Admission $8, $4 for Wyoming residents.
Fremont County
Officially Hamilton City: a gold camp of 1868 whose mine shut in 1882; no one lived there by 2015. Seventeen log and rough-lumber buildings stand on BLM land northeast of Atlantic City, with a rugged walking path through the site. No fee.
Park County
Gold and silver camp of 1885 high in the Absaroka Range, emptied after a 1907 avalanche killed three people. Many buildings stand in the Shoshone National Forest, about two hours up the Wood River Road from Meeteetse; the Forest Service recommends four-wheel drive for the rough last miles.
Uinta County
Union Pacific wood and water stop of 1867, stranded when the Aspen Tunnel rerouted the line in the early 1900s. Three and a half of Moses Byrne's stone charcoal kilns stand beside the county road, open sunrise to sunset; the townsite is private ranch land.
Carbon County
Army post of 1868 on the North Platte, built to guard the railroad and abandoned in 1886. A state historic site off I-80 exit 228 with foundations and a few standing structures.
Carbon County
Wyoming's first coal town, founded in 1868 on the Union Pacific and abandoned after the mines closed in 1902. WyoHistory found foundations, mine ruins and the old railroad grade in 2014, and the cemetery has been refurbished. It says the seasonal county road crosses private land through two gates, and vehicle access can be arranged by appointment through the Hanna Basin Museum.
Hot Springs County
Coal town of 1907 north of Thermopolis that once held more than 2,000 people; mining ended in 1938 and the town was bulldozed in 1971. A few buildings and the cemetery remain on BLM land. Stay out of the tunnels.
Park County
Wartime camp that held about 14,000 Japanese Americans (13,997 by Wikipedia's count) between August 1942 and November 1945. Hospital buildings, a root cellar and a barrack survive beside the interpretive center near Powell.
Fremont County
Uranium company town of 1957 that lost more than 95 percent of its people after the mine shut in 1982. Cowboy State Daily put the population at about 60 in July 2026; Wikipedia lists a cafe and bar, a church, a pottery and a motel on the Rawlins to Riverton highway.
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 Wyoming index, with its county. A ◦ marks sites already on the map.
No sites match. Try fewer letters or another county.
Plan a trip
Wyoming's ghost towns sit high. South Pass City is at 7,840 feet, Sherman at 8,035 and Kirwin's weather station at 9,550. South Pass City's buildings open from Memorial Day to mid-October and Fort Fred Steele closes for the winter on Labor Day. On the Kirwin road, Brown Mountain Campground typically runs from early or mid May to mid October. Outside summer, ask the land manager about snow on the dirt roads before you drive to the high camps.
The Forest Service calls Kirwin a two-hour drive from Meeteetse on the Wood River Road, with rough final miles where four-wheel drive is recommended, and the Meeteetse Museums recommend a high-clearance four-wheel-drive vehicle for its multiple river crossings. Piedmont's kilns are about ten miles off I-80 by the state's count, on County Road 173. Services are thin: Jeffrey City's motel may be the only lodging on the 122 miles between Rawlins and Riverton. Fill the tank and carry water and an offline map.
The Bureau of Land Management runs about 18.4 million acres of Wyoming, and Miner's Delight and Gebo are BLM sites with no fee. South Pass City, Fort Fred Steele and the Piedmont kilns are state historic sites. State trust lands are open for day use where they can be reached legally, but off-road driving, overnight camping and open fires are prohibited on them. Many other sites, including the Cambria townsite, are on private ranch land, so treat fences and posted signs as closed.
The BLM says Gebo's coal tunnels are old and unstable and entering them is not allowed; treat every shaft and adit at the gold and copper camps the same way. At Wyoming state historic sites, metal detecting is prohibited and removing or disturbing any artifact, relic or historic feature needs the superintendent's permission. On federal land, artifacts at least 100 years old are protected by the Archaeological Resources Protection Act.
FAQ
There is no official count. Wikipedia's list is openly incomplete, and totals depend on whether you count railroad sidings, forts and coal camps that were bulldozed. Our index lists 84 sites in 19 of the state's 23 counties; 52 of them have coordinates on our map so far. Carbon County has the most, with 13.
South Pass City. The state keeps more than 30 historic buildings from the 1867 gold rush and owns the Carissa Mine, and the town is where Esther Hobart Morris became justice of the peace in 1870, which WyoHistory calls the first appointment of a woman to public office. Miner's Delight, a few miles away, is a BLM-managed ghost town with 17 log and rough-lumber buildings. Kirwin, high in the Absarokas, keeps many of its buildings; the Forest Service recommends four-wheel drive for the last miles.
From Cheyenne, Hecla is about 40 minutes away and Sherman, where the Ames Monument marks the old Union Pacific summit, under an hour. From Casper, Bessemer Bend is half an hour and Jeffrey City a little over two hours. These are routed estimates; dirt roads are slower than the router assumes.
At some. The BLM allows stays of up to 14 days at Gebo and runs two campgrounds in the South Pass Historic Mining Area near Miner's Delight. Wood River and Brown Mountain campgrounds lie on the road to Kirwin; Brown Mountain was due to close for the season on October 18, 2026 and usually opens in early or mid May. Overnight camping is prohibited on state trust lands.
Many are on private ranch land, including the Cambria townsite in Weston County. The sites you can count on are public: South Pass City, Fort Fred Steele and the Piedmont kilns (state), Miner's Delight and Gebo (BLM), Kirwin (Shoshone National Forest) and Heart Mountain (a nonprofit interpretive center). Check the status line on each town page before you drive.
Abandoned