Once again, my ghost town pages are filling up so quickly that I have to create a new one! I'm also making an effort to include more history for you, the viewer.  Hey, I'm all about customer satisfaction.

    Again, most of the black and white images on this page were shot with Ilford SFX 200, a near-infrared film, to add a more dramatic effect than that offered by more conventional monochrome films.

    To learn more about these ghost towns (after seeing my photos, of course!) visit Ghost Towns.com or Arizona Ghost Towns.com for more detailed history.

Charleston and Millville

    These two towns were once thriving communities located just across the San Pedro River from each other.  Located between Tombstone and Fort Huachuca, they enjoyed a steady stream of cash flow from the miners of the one and were protected from Apaches by the soldiers of the other.  Millville processed the ore from the Lucky Cuss, the Tough Nut, and other Tombstone mines.  Millville's workers, camp followers, bartenders, and others lived across the river in Charleston, a town with an even rowdier reputation than Tombstone.  Charleston became known as "The Town Too Mean to Live," a play on Tombstone's nickname, "The Town Too Tough to Die."  When Tombstone's mines flooded, both of these towns were doomed to extinction and began fading into the mesquite.  Troops from Fort Huachuca hastened the process when they used Charleston for live-fire exercises during World War II.  Both towns now lie in the San Pedro Riparian Conservation Area.  Cochise County, Arizona.  Photographed April 2003.
 
 

Little remains of Millville other than this ruin and a few scattered walls.
Thankfully, this graffiti is under a bridge and not on any actual ruins.	Cottonwoods tower over the San Pedro River	The remains of Charleston, huddled beneath the mesquite

Courtland

    Mining town with one unfriendly resident left (see sign below).  Amazingly, this former town of 2,000 used to have a movie theater, ince cream shop, a car dealership, and two newspapers.  Since I grew up in Georgia, I'm proud of one of the front page headlines in the first issue of the Courtland Arizonan.   "GEORGIANS ARE TO LOCATE HERE.  Number of the Best Families in the Cracker State for Courtland and Vicinity."  With its scant remains, Courtland is a classic example of the wide margin between boom and bust, or dust.   Cochise County, Arizona.  Photographed May 2001.
 

Kentucky Camp

    Farming and mining community now being restored by the Forest Service.  Two sections of the Arizona Trail join at the townsite.  Santa Cruz County, Arizona.  Photographed November 2001.
 
 

Dripping Springs

    More of a mining camp than a ghost town.  Located in what is now Organ Pipe National Monument, Pima County, Arizona.  Photographed October 2001.
 
 

Elgin

    Still survives as a center for several wineries in Santa Cruz County, Arizona.  Arizona wine, you say? Believe it -- some great vintages come out of this tiny hamlet.  Photographed October 2001.

Harshaw

    Another tiny mining community in Santa Cruz County, Arizona.  Photographed October 2001.

Greaterville

    Farming community in Santa Cruz County, Arizona.  Not much left to see.  Visited October 2001.
 

Cochise

    Former watering and fueling stop on the Southern Pacific railroad.  At its peak, Cochise boasted a population of 3,000; today its population is about 1% of that.  Cochise County, Arizona.  Photographed January 2003.

Dragoon Springs

    Another watering station, but for the Butterfield Overland Mail Route.  This station was the site of a Confederate battle during the Civil War, but unlike the Battle of Picacho Pass, it wasn't against Union forces.  Apaches attacked a small party of Confederates who were sheltering in the fort, killing four; their bodies remain buried at the site.  Cochise County, Arizona.  Photographed January 2003.
 
 

More to come.