Looking north from the east portal of the tunnel… a beautiful place. Wilderness. Mamiya 6/Portra 160
history under ground
120-film
Kat dancing down the trestle, which is one of the highest in the state, standing about 100 feet over the road. Mamiya 6/Portra 160
A social club/restaurant that was likely the place to be late at night.
That floor isn’t dirt–it’s old rotting grain that’s formed into a sort of moldy mud.
A rare door left on the workhouse. The stairs to the left led down into a flooded basement. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
Looking through a launcher doorway at an outbuilding… the fire truck garage, if I recall correctly. Fomapan medium format in Pentax 67.
Beautiful belt wheels above the grain cribs. Getting to the spot where this was taken is now impossible, and I don’t know whether these remain or not anymore.
Camera: Pentax 67.
On the dark side of the workhouse at sunset, you can almost see where the walls used to be. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
A row of houses north of Pommenige.
Looking toward the famous Duluth Aerial Lift Bridge from Lake Superior. Shot on a the legendary Pentax 67.
Looking at the tallest part of the plant from a skeletal loading dock. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
Shot on a Pentax 67 in monochrome and toned to match the set. For some time the marquee was lit at night to advertise the fact that the city bought it and planned to apply for credits to repair it.
The first 800 or so feet of the tunnel is finished with reinforced concrete. The test is raw stone. This is the spot where it switches. Side note: nailing this shot on film is one of my proudest light-painted moments.
The portal facing Taconite Harbor (at a healthy distance) is mostly closed. Some kids put bullet holes in it. Shooting down a long tunnel is extremely dangerous, and you should not do it, obviously. Mamiya 6/Portra 160
A sentinel stands watch over an abandoned Hannah, ND house. Medium Format.
Vents in the boards over the windows helps prevent mold and animals from getting too crazy inside.
An old sign in front of the elevators that used to constitute Saskatchewan Wheat Pool #4. Kodak Pro 100.
The west portal of the tunnel is open, and if it wasn’t for the rough track, I would think by looking at it that a train could be coasting up behind me any moment. Mamiya 6/Portra 160
Looking across at the Cargill elevator.
Checking out the neighbors. Shot on a the legendary Pentax 67.
A defunct UGG elevator in Killarney, not far from where the Harrisons (of Holmfield, MB and Harrison Milling) once operated a small elevator. Medium Format.
The coal extractor swings back and forth, ripping coal from the ground and throwing it on a conveyor belt to be burned a few miles away.
Ektar 100/Mamiya 6. A ghost town near Martinsdale, where the market (pictured) served as the train stop.
King Elevator sits in the corner of a more recently-defunct lumber mill: Great Western Timber. Perhaps in the future I will write the history of it. Arista 100 in 120.
Camera: Pentax 67. Film: Kodak Ektar 100.
This part of the workhouse was sheathed in fiberglass, but now you can see its insides from a mile away.
The metallic arms of the missile erector, which would stand rockets over the blast pit in the launch position. Medium Format film–cheap but excellent Fomapan 100 in a Pentax 67.
A row of houses north of Pommenige.
A storm passes over BOMARC’s center row of launch buildings. You can clearly see the tracks on which the roof would retract for launch.
Ektar 100/Mamiya 6.
Looking out the window a the foundations of the demolished company homes.
An engine on display outside the Montana Territorial Prison in Deer Lodge, MT. This was a typical electric locomotive used by The Milwaukee Road.
Inside the west portal is a big liquid propane hand warmer, for workers to take the cold off their gloves as they handled the switches and doors of Cramer Tunnel. Mamiya GA645 / Kodak Pro 400
Pozo Mine, the most menacing mine building I’ve ever seen. Black and white film, shot with the Fuji GX680, a beast of a camera.
Don’t you love the shape of the house on the right?
At the extreme eastern end of the plant is a bank of modern concrete silos. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
The flour mill (rear) and its elevators. The taller elevator was moved here in 1955, when the Harrisons bought it from Federal, who declared it surplus. The smaller elevator replaced an earlier smaller warehouse in 1926. Taken shortly after dawn. This one picture made the drive worth it, for me. Medium Format.
The depot at the head of town seems to be being disassembled. Behind it is a dead signal where the tracks used to be; they’ve been pulled.
Looking at the concrete headframe from street level. Acros 100 in Pentax 67
The top floor of the Chateau was the original surgical suite. Later, hydrotherapy took place here. When Nopeming was converted to a nursing home, it was a place where residents watched movies. Portra 400 on Voigtlander Bessa.
A train idles beside the Calumet offices. Pentax 67 Medium Format
The Harrison flour mill, completed in 1897 and expanded in 1901 and 1902. The tunnel that I am standing on probably transported grain from the elevator to the mill. Medium Format.
The steam plant at Nopeming is an iconic (and crooked) smokestack. Kodak Pro 400 on a Fuji GX680.
This building was 99 years old when it was demolished for the coal mine.
Elevator B, used by a local farmer, stands behind an old farm truck at the edge of town.
The roof of the King Elevator had two small vents and a terrific view of Sleeping Giant Provincial Park. Arista 100 in 120.
The Peavey logo, before it rusted off and the offices were demolished.
The old offices for the Oberon Elevator are defunct, but seem to be holding up to the brutal prairie snows and winds. Medium Format.
Camera: Pentax 67.
One of Martinsdale’s defunct businesses perpendicular to the depot. Recall that Martinsdale is a T-town.
Scanned after being recovered from the bottom of an old wooden box for a few years. Circa 2005.
East Elevation of the Depot. Ektar 100/Mamiya 6
An abandoned house at Tilston, MB.
Taking a midwinter hike in Cramer after a blizzard and ice storm was my idea. Do my friends seem upset to you?
Mamiya GA645 / Kodak Pro 400
The top floor of the Dominion Elevator. Acros 100 on 120.
West Elevation of the Depot. Ektar 100/Mamiya 6
You can almost make out the concrete chute through the open window. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
A photo from the early 2000s before the conveyors were scrapped.
One side of the street is demolished. The other is not.
Scanned after being recovered from the bottom of an old wooden box for a few years. Circa 2005. The only photo I have showing the steam locomotive out front.
Both portals get clogged with ice in the winter. In the summer, the ceiling is always dripping. Mamiya GA645 / Kodak Pro 400
The only door into a large windowless concrete room, probably a storage bin. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
Part of the grain dust venting system, dislodged from its place above the dumping hatches under the grain cribs.
The Calumet Elevator offices used to be flanked on both sides by rails. Now, only one side has engines running on it.