Whether abroad or in our own backyard, something about abandonment both scares and fascinates us. The explosion that followed sent flames and radioactive material soaring into the skies over Pripyat, a nearby city built to house the plant’s scientists and workers. Ruins of the martyred village Oradour-sur-Glane, photographed in 2014. Calico, California: Calico ghost town is the place which is a silver mining town from 1880 to 1890 which consists of 500 total mines and the estimated value of these mines is $20 million. Soviet authorities later sealed off an 18-mile exclusion zone surrounding Chernobyl, leaving Pripyat an abandoned ghost town. At its height, it had more than 2,000 buildings, but when the gold ran out, so did the population. Old Cahawba doesn’t shy away from its unearthly vibe, with champions of this abandoned locale declaring it “Alabama’s most famous Ghost Town.” From … It was finally abandoned in 1940. Rather than rebuild the town, a new one was built a few kilometres away. This is despite its proximity to heavily populated cities like Fremont, San Jose, and San Francisco. From the infamous nuclear disaster zone near Chernobyl to Henry Ford’s doomed jungle paradise, learn the stories behind six of the world’s most famous vacant towns and villages. Bodie town was started in 1859 by a mining prospector named William S. Bodey after he discovered deposits of gold in the area. Bankhead was previously a successful coal mining town. Eventually the mine became unprofitable. This desolate former mining town in Montana is so riddled with paranormal activity it was featured in an episode of the Travel Channel's Ghost Adventures. From Pennsylvania to Alaska, the abandoned cities are all worth visiting. Most assumed they would return once the fighting stopped, but ongoing political strife has seen Varosha waste away behind a heavily-guarded barrier ever since. When the Standard Company discovered substantial amounts of gold-bearing ore in Bodie in 1876, the town was instantly converted from a small mining camp to one of California's biggest towns. Most workers found the cramped conditions unlivable, and the city was promptly abandoned after the mine closed in 1974. It was a German mining settlement in the Namibian Desert. The Turkish ghost town of Kayaköy (Shutterstock). Like a straight-up Western movie set, Bodie is one of the most famous (and the largest unreconstructed) ghost towns in America. But then in 1890 the, value of this place was much decreased and, residents started to leave this place because of the stories of different buildings there. Although the town was named in his honor, William never saw it grow to be… The remains of the Fordlandia hospital on July 6, 2017 in Aveiro, Brazil. Established in 1859 when William S. … Tucked away in the Belice Valley in north-west Sicily, Poggioreale was destroyed when an earthquake hit the region in 1968. However, substandard living conditions led to striking miners, the longest of which lasted eight months. Long before it was occupied by miners in the late 1800s, Berlin was home to a sharp-toothed carnivorous marine reptile who roamed the warm ocean waters inundating Nevada 225 million years ago. A man named Howard E. Perry from Maine owned much of the land and started the Chisos Mining Company, which brought many people to the town in the early 1900s. Fordlandia is exactly what it sounds like—a manufacturing settlement established by Henry Ford in 1929 as a response to the British monopoly on rubber. Berlin’s first ichthyosaur fossils were discovered in the 1950s, and excavations revealed giant remains of these ancient animals that reached lengths of 50 feet. It is located at the southwestern part of West Virginia which is now included as one of the most attractive old town all over US. January 23, 2012, DE, 4 Comments. Perhaps it’s being able to see the remnants of a once-popular, once-thriving town that has been left to the elements. The settlement was established in 1904 by a Norwegian sea captain as a whaling station for his fishing company. Forty years of neglect have left Hashima a dilapidated ruin of collapsed staircases and condemned apartments. It was closed in December 1966, but the church is still used occasionally for marriages. Its 200 ramshackle buildings are kept in state of “arrested decay” by park rangers, and tourists flock to the site to explore its 1880s Methodist church, saloons and post office as well as the ruins of a burned-out bank vault. Famous Ghost Towns of the World. The mining town is preserved in a state of "arrested decay" by the California State Parks System. By the 1950s, it was tapped out and the tiny Germanic-looking town built up around it was left to the sands, to make an eerily photogenic site, along with the rest of the wrecks that line this stretch of Namibia’s coast. Today Texas is littered with "Ghost Towns," each of which adds a little to the legend and lore of the Lone Star State, denoted by historical markers found at the old centers of these deserted towns. A man named Howard E. Perry from Maine owned much of the land and started the Chisos Mining Company, which brought many people to the town in the early 1900s. This historic landmark located about 45 minutes away from Sin City, and is considered to be one of the most famous Nevada ghost tows. A new Oradour-sur-Glane was built nearby after the war ended, but French President Charles de Gaulle ordered that the burned-out ruins of the old town be left untouched as a monument to the victims. Having already left his mark on cities like Dearborn, Michigan, he designed a company town complete with swimming pools, a golf course, suburban-style bungalows and weekly square dancing sessions. A building in Rhyolite, Nevada's ghost town (Shutterstock). Like most boomtowns, Bodie eventually went bust. Founded in 1862 when John White discovered gold on Grasshopper Creek, Bannack was a typical gold rush town in the Wild West. From a remote mining town in New Zealand to a scary 'ghost island' in Japan, we introduce 14 ghost worlds across six continents. Old rusty whaling boats in Grytviken, South Georgia (Shutterstock). With a pioneering past, British Columbia's boom and bust towns have left us with more than a few (mostly) abandoned ghost towns. By the 1880s, it had outgrown its meager infrastructure, and a succession of harsh and deadly winters convinced many of its prospectors to move to more profitable locales. There are no pins in your viewport. Lying 540km south-west of Buenos Aires, it is now accessible via a rough track lined with petrified trees – a ghostly snapshot of a town caught mid-step. The following are top 10 scariest ghost towns located in the whole America: 10. It attracts plenty of photographers and filmmakers because it looks like it was taken straight from the Wild West. What is left stands as a spooky time capsule of the 1970s, including bellbottoms in shop windows and 40-year-old vehicles still parked at car dealerships. Students chairs stand on rotting floorboards in an auditorium of an abandoned school on September 30, 2015 in Pripyat, Ukraine. It was once home to over 100,000 people but fell into a state of ruin during the bloody Nagorno-Karabakh War when it was occupied by Armenian forces. Ghost towns hold a strange attraction for travelers. It is also recognized as a National Historic Landmark by the Department of Interior and is formally identified as Bodie State Historic Park. Now, visitors can only set foot here on an official tour from nearby Nagasaki, but this eerie metropolis (once home to over 5,000) is worth it. Map updates are paused. Start Date. Its buildings have decayed and been partially reclaimed by the elements, and wild animals roam through what were once bustling apartments, sports complexes and an amusement park. Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town. ” Learn More Granite Ghost Town State Park Philipsburg. HISTORY reviews and updates its content regularly to ensure it is complete and accurate. By the 1960s, over-expansion had caused landslides that forced its 1,800 residents – some still living in medieval conditions – to move out. These ghost towns stand as eerie monuments to the eras of the past, and some have even found a second life as tourist attractions and movie sets. There are campgrounds nearby for people looking to get an overnight experience. Sign up today for free and be the first to get notified of new articles, new competitions, new events and more! Andia/Universal Images Group/Getty Images. The suburb boasted a thriving tourism economy, and celebrities such as Elizabeth Taylor and Brigitte Bardot were known to take in the sand and sun at its high-class beachfront hotels. Albert Canyon (east of Revelstoke): Located a short distance south of the Canyon Hot Springs. Since t… All Rights Reserved. Bodie, California, is perhaps one of the best-known ghost towns, thanks to the high level of preservation; it is actually being kept in a state of “arrested decay,” freezing the town in time for visitors. This city in northern Ukraine is probably the most famous ghost town in the world. The fire still burns underground to the day, the effects being seen in the buckled and cracked highway leading into the town. Would you dare to visit any of them? Ghost towns: once thriving communities that have dwindled over the decades. ” “ This is good collection of historically significant homes and buildings. https://travel.usnews.com/gallery/americas-15-coolest-ghost-towns-to-visit https://www.mountainliving.com/6-famous-mountain-ghost-towns Robert Alexander/Archive Photos/Getty Images. Thurmond, West Virginia Photo by @3up2up. In the town post office, hundreds of letters from 1986 still sit waiting to be mailed. Ghost towns of the American West; Ghost town Gallery; Lost America; Monument Gallery; Ghosttowns of the US at Rootsweb; Ghosttowns.de This page was last edited on 25 December 2020, at 00:31 (UTC). Located on the south side of Chilkoot Pass, Dyea was one of the Alaska ghost towns that was once a booming place filled with gold miners and entrepreneurs chasing opportunity. Some ghost towns are protected by parks departments. Drawbridge, California, is a ghost town with a population of zero. Established in 1859 when William S. … At 1:23 a.m. on April 26, 1986, a catastrophic meltdown took place inside reactor number four at the Soviet nuclear power plant at Chernobyl. Since then, Bodie has become known as one of the nation’s most well preserved ghost towns. Indiana. Ringed by a great seawall, it is tightly packed with high rises for the workers who once manned its undersea mine, and when that closed some 45 years ago, everyone left. The ruined buildings of Hashima, famous as the nickname "Gunkan jima (Warship Island)", are seen on July 13, 2009 in Nagasaki, Japan. The abandoned yet beautiful medieval town of Craco, Italy (Shutterstock). The road in Centralia was abandoned because of a mining fire (Shutterstock). 5. It took 36 hours before the town’s 49,000 residents were evacuated, and many later suffered severe health effects as a result of th… 15 Lost Worlds that are asking to be explored, These are the most haunted places in history. As we are about to find out, however, that is not always so. During one riot over cafeteria rules, Fordlandia’s employees destroyed most of their mess hall with machetes and pushed the town’s trucks into the river. Trees have grown through the floors of restaurants and homes, and most of the former residents’ belongings have been looted or destroyed. Only a handful of people managed to survive by playing dead and later fleeing to the forest. Ruins of the lost city of Epecuén in Argentina (Shutterstock). Indiana is a ghost town found within the Ruthven Park National Historic Site; 1 km North of Haldimand County. Zoom in to see updated info. In the early 20th century, this isolated part of the Skeleton Coast was abuzz. However, after World War II, the mine flooded, the mineral price fell, and the tiny town of Terlingua saw … In what is believed to have been an act of revenge for the town’s supposed support of the French Resistance, a Nazi Waffen SS detachment rounded up and murdered 642 of its residents and burned most of their houses to the ground. Hashima remained a hive of activity for the next several decades, especially during World War II, when the Japanese forced thousands of Korean laborers and Chinese POWs to toil in its mines. The explosion that followed sent flames and radioactive material soaring into the skies over Pripyat, a nearby city built to house the plant’s scientists and workers. An old building and cityscape in Pyramiden (Shutterstock). That’s what makes them ghost towns, at least. Ghost towns hold a strange attraction for travelers. The ghost town is now preserved as a museum village, with hundreds of … It was ultimately abandoned to the elements where houses and buildings stand deserted and full of sand. In the early 1970s, the immaculate beaches of Varosha, Cyprus served as one of the most popular millionaires’ playgrounds in the Mediterranean. The men were taken to barns and machine-gunned, and the women and children were locked in a church and killed with explosives and incendiary grenades. From the infamous nuclear disaster zone near Chernobyl to Henry Ford’s doomed jungle paradise, learn the stories behind six of the world’s most famous vacant towns and villages. Among ghost towns of the world, Kolmanskop in Namibia is quite famous. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. It is still a popular tourist site and even has a museum established in 1980. On the afternoon of June 10, 1944, the village of Oradour-sur-Glane was the scene of one of the worst massacres of French civilians during World War II. There are ghost towns around and sometimes even inside famous… But Bodie, CA, protects itself—with a curse.For years, visitors to this ghost town have … Abandoned building, Pripyat, Ukraine (Shutterstock). FACT CHECK: We strive for accuracy and fairness. “ The Nevada City Ghost Town Museum is one of the only places that I have been to that rivals Old Trail Town in Cody, WY for an awesome collection of historic places from the old west. From evacuated cities such as Chernobyl to a diamond paradise, the experts at Property Turkey have narrowed it down to the top 7 famous ghost towns and abandoned cities Bodie, California Located east of the Sierra Nevada mountain range in California OD is a ghost town … End Date. The automotive magnate needed the town as a steady source of rubber for his car tires and hoses, but he also saw the venture as a chance to bring small town American values to the Amazon. While radiation levels in Pripyat have dropped enough in recent years to allow urban explorers and former residents to make brief visits, scientists estimate that it could take several centuries before the town is once again safe for habitation. Abandoned after the Chernobyl nuclear in April 1986, this town has become a potent symbol of the inherent dangers of harnessing nuclear power. Fordlandia’s rubber trees fell victim to leaf fungus, and its employees chafed under the town’s strict regulations, which included a ban on alcohol. It took 36 hours before the town’s 49,000 residents were evacuated, and many later suffered severe health effects as a result of their brief exposure to the fallout. 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