Victims of gold rushes, floods, fires, the town from the cartoon Cars, the center of the colonists of the Wild West, and other towns with the prefix “former.
Kennecott, Alaska
Not all that glitters is gold, but gold isn’t the only way to make a fortune. Hardy diggers began streaming into this remote corner of Alaska in the 1900s, after a couple of prospectors stumbled on a $200 million pile of copper ore.
In 1903, the Utah Copper Company was formed, and it turned this place into a self-contained working-class community with a tennis court and an ice rink. By 1938, however, the copper deposits were running low, and the mines had to be closed. Today the abandoned village of Kennecott is a U.S. National Historic Landmark and part of Rangel St. Elias National Park.
St. Elmo, Colorado
Once a pompous city of gold miners and a popular stop for railroad travelers to the Pacific Coast, St. Elmo was founded in 1880.
It used to have two thousand residents and 150 mines, as well as hotels, breweries, brothels and the best discotheques of the day. In 1910, the Alpine railroad tunnel was closed. Prices for precious metals had already dropped by that time, and rail service was discontinued in 1922.
Now there’s not much left here: a small house where you can stay, and a store for all occasions, open from summer to October, weather permitting, where you can buy all sorts of antiques and rent an all-terrain vehicle.
Virginia City, Montana
An old gold mining town (founded in 1863), home of Calamity Jane, a famous character in American Wild West stories and a participant in the Indian Wars. Virginia City had a bad reputation, there were no law enforcement, no court system, and as a result no one was surprised by murders and robberies, gangs were on the roads and in 1863-1864 no less than 100 people were killed in Virginia City alone.
For a time the city was the capital of the Montana Territory (before Montana became a state) with a population of about ten thousand. About half of the buildings of that time have been preserved and restored, and now Virginia City is a popular tourist destination, an open-air museum of the Wild West.
Batstow Village, New Jersey
Named for the Swedish word “batstu” (bath, sauna), Batstow Village was once a bustling ironworks center serving the needs of the Continental Army during the American Civil War.
Today about 40 buildings remain from the town, founded as early as 1766, including an industrialist residence, sawmill, blacksmith shop, icehouse, dairy, carriage house, stables and a department store. A postcard can be sent from the post office – it is open and working. The buildings are fully restored and maintained as a historical landmark. There is a museum and tourist information center.
