The old bank building at Rhyolite Ghost Town near Death Valley, CA
About this photograph
- Creator
- Margery H. Freeman
- Date created
- April 1977
- Location
- Near Death Valley, California
- License
- This photograph copyright ©1977. All Rights Reserved
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The skeleton of the old bank building at Rhyolite Ghost Town near Death Valley, California. In the early 1900s, Rhyolite was a booming mine town. The nearby Montgomery Shoshone Mine spurred a wave of development and interest in the town. Bob Montgomery claimed that he could harvest $10,000 per day in ore from the mine. The town included foundries, electric plants, machine shops, stores, hotels, and even a school for 250 children. It supported an active social scene with variety shows at the opera house, picnics, a symphony, dances, and baseball games. By 1907, electricity came to the town. But financial disaster gripped the area as mines started to shut down and as newspapers, banks, and the mill failed. In 1911, town directors shut down the Montgomery Shoshone Mine and the mill, and in 1916, power to the town was shut off.
Today, visitors to the park can see the remnants of several buildings, including the bank, the jail, and the train depot, one of the few whole buildings in the town. Other attractions include a bottle house built by a miner in 1906 out of 50,000 liquor and beer bottles. The town is not actually located within the boundaries of Death Valley National Park.
