The West is full of towns that ended. Some left a jail, a schoolhouse and a cemetery; some left a name and a coordinate. The twelve below are ghost towns in the directory with enough history on record to be worth the drive, one per state, each with a map pin.
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Agua Mansa, California
Colton, CA · official site
Agua Mansa (Spanish for "gentle water") is a former settlement in an unincorporated area of San Bernardino County, near Colton, California, United States. Once the largest settlement in San Bernardino County, it is now a ghost town. Only the cemetery…
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Granada War Relocation Center
Prowers County, CO · official site
Granada War Relocation Center, known to the internees as Camp Amache ( ah-mah-chee) and later designated the Amache National Historic Site, was a concentration camp for Japanese Americans in Prowers County, Colorado. Following the Japanese attack on Pearl…
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Silver City, Idaho
ID · official site
Silver City is a ghost town in northwestern Owyhee County, Idaho, United States, that is listed on the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP). At its height in the 1880s, it was a gold and silver mining town with a population of around 2,500 and…
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Bannack, Montana
Beaverhead County, MT · official site
Bannack is a ghost town in Beaverhead County, Montana, United States, located on Grasshopper Creek, approximately 11 miles (18 km) upstream from where Grasshopper Creek joins with the Beaverhead River south of Dillon. Founded in 1862, the town is a…
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Rhyolite, Nevada
Nye County, NV · official site
Rhyolite is a ghost town in Nye County, Nevada, United States. It is in the Bullfrog Hills, about 120 miles (190 km) northwest of Las Vegas, near the eastern boundary of Death Valley National Park. The town began in early 1905 as one of several mining…
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Champoeg, Oregon
OR · official site
Champoeg ( sham-POO-ee, historically sham-POO-eg) is a former town in the U.S. state of Oregon. Now a ghost town, it was an important settlement in the Willamette Valley in the early 1840s. Located halfway between Oregon City and Salem, it was the site of…
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Washington-on-the-Brazos, Texas
Washington County, TX · official site
Washington-on-the-Brazos, also known simply as Washington, is an unincorporated community along the Brazos River in Washington County, Texas, United States. The town is best known for being the site of the Convention of 1836 and the signing of the Texas…
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Thistle, Utah
UT · official site
Thistle is a ghost town in Spanish Fork Canyon in southeastern Utah County, Utah, United States. During the era of steam locomotives, the town's primary industry was servicing trains for the Denver and Rio Grande Western Railroad (often shortened to D&RG,…
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Barron
WA · official site
Barron is a ghost town in Washington. Today Barron is one of the most intact ghost towns in the state. There are several standing cabins and an equal number of collapsed ones. You don’t have to look hard to find several mining shafts/entrances, many of…
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South Pass City, Wyoming
Fremont County, WY · official site
South Pass City is an unincorporated community in Fremont County, Wyoming, United States. It is located 2 miles (3 km) south of the intersection of highways 28 and 131. A former mining town near the Oregon Trail, it became a ghost town after later gold…
Visiting a ghost town
Many sit on private or BLM land, down unpaved roads with no services. Check access before you go, carry water, tell someone your route, and leave everything exactly where you found it — the next visitor is counting on it.
Reported hauntings are folklore and visitor accounts, not established fact. Hours, prices and access change — confirm with each operator before you travel, and never trespass on private land.