Short-stack remains of mounts for rod and ball mills, if I was to bet. The concentrator separated junk rock (tails) from the copper and silver ore, to such a point it could be smelted.
history under ground
clouds
Different doors for different vehicles, I would guess. White Pine Mine used tire-based vehicles, rather than track-based, making it pretty different than other mines I’ve been to.
From a distance (here, Union Yards), you can still see ARMOUR spelled out on the smokestack in white brick.
A shot of Longmont from the highway. Fuji 35mm.
“Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve been getting reports that several Yellow Helicopters have been seen hovering above town. We are all aware of the Black Helicopters, which are World Government, and Blue Helicopters, which are Secret Police, and the Helicopters with Detailed Murals of Diving Birds of Prey, which are the helicopters that took all the children in Night Vale away a few months ago (we still don’t know what those helicopters are but they did bring all the children back unharmed, and much more well-behaved than before, so they are deemed just as safe as the other helicopters) but these new Yellow Helicopters, no one quite knows.” – Welcome to Night Vale, Ep. 32
One of my favorite images from my stay… Note the snowed-over road in the distance! This is looking toward Animas Forks.
A buck-fifty shot for a postcard stand. Taken from the Stone Arch Bridge.
Even with a hundred people parked in front of the lakeside relic, it was invisible.
Sunrise in SEMI. The shadow of Kurth Malt is cast across ADM-Delmar #1. Clouds behind ADM-Delmar #4 light up. It’s cold and the air smells like train grease.
One of the old cooperage buildings is largely unchanged from when it was built. The raised section of the building houses a crane.
The back of the castle is barely visible through the trees that have grown thick around the walls, making it look so much older.
From the highest roof of Ogvilvie’s, Thunder Bay looks like paradise.
The elevator tower seems to have been built with expansion of the dock in mind.
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 complex was so big that trains could make deliveries through the middle of it, passing below this striped skyway.
The rear of the complex shows the more than 100 year old workhouse–still working! I do not know if the tanks are original to the 1901 elevator, but I suspect so.
The St. Louis County Sheriff constantly patrols the property looking for trespassers.
The copula stacks were fitted with scrubbers. Making metal is a very polluting activity.
The front of the mill reads “Montana Flour Mills Company”
The lower door is where the rocket exhaust would flow into the blast pit during initial launch. The upper doors would vent the rocket so the erector and other equipment in the building would not be (as) damaged.
This photo illustrates how vertical the complex is.
The command building and a coolant tank. In the distance, rain and hail pound Wyoming dirt.
An abandoned ranch on the east side of the tracks. This was not the Colmor Cutoff they were waiting for.
One leg of the headframe meets the hoist house. Two cranes are rusted in place.
Looking at the huge and modern Cargill B2 from the circa-1919 Lake Superior “I”. This is a rather unique perspective of Enger Tower and Skyline.
There are 700 of these storage bunkers. Their design was to funnel explosions upward, rather than toward other buildings, to minimize secondary explosions.
No matter what environmental disasters industry throws at Mother Earth, she will bounce back.
After a short rainfall douses the mill in downtown Fergus Falls, the river next to the brick walls swells and the sounds of water overtakes the echos of the nearby bars. Reflections are on the foundation of the former distribution and rail building.
A gate large enough to accommodate a missile, next to the ruins of the guard shack. Wyoming is the intersection of lonely and beautiful.
Unloading boats had the option to take on fuel at Taconite Harbor. This building, among other things, pumped fuel to the dock.
Some guerilla art for passing drivers on I-94 East to enjoy. Artist unknown.
Looking out of the Brewery Creek Drain outfall at night, after a storm had pushed piles of rocks up onto the shore.
Before the clouds broke, I snapped this profile of the dumping control room and its spiral staircase. These are the colors that I dream in.
A bridge crosses the main street of the village; one that goes nowhere. Ambiguity intended.
A multi-family home with an attic bedroom. The staircase was unstable, to say the least.
Looking out at the abandoned neighborhood around the house.
The BOMARC launch buildings are spaced on a large concrete pad that looks like a parking lot. Out of view are underground pipes for fueling and cooling the rocket motors.
Through a section of the tailings boom where mountain winds tore open the sheet metal around the conveyor, I poked my head out.
A row of security lights line the roof of the power station.
No ambiguity here… miners, check in at this office.
Taken just after the sun set over Duluth. Don’t you love that green glow?
From Main Street, looking straight up at the A Mill, only the silence makes one think that nobody’s still inside, grinding grain into Pillsbury’s Best.
Kate in the crow’s next… very shaky by the time she got to it.
Summertime is when Duluth goes to the lakeside to listen to music, visit traveling fairs, and talk to neighbors about the smell of the lake. As seen from the castle walls.
On top of the light hoop, 160-feet up, a ship comes into port, ready to load-up. If you look really close, you can see my shadow cast on the dock below, courtesy of the full moon.
One of the last times I saw the skyway standing. ADM’s Meal Elevator is in the distance.
A row of houses north of Pommenige.
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.
A long exposure under the trestle-like approach to the dock, under which trains still pass regularly.
HDR matrix panorama. Looking from the grain elevators, now doomed, toward the city between the flour mill’s water tower and tile elevator’s neon sign, the old and new economies seem almost united. Yet the financial centers rise in reality to shadow the now-abandoned industry and manufacturing. The way of things, I’m told.
There is no denying that the Fergus Falls asylum was a beautiful place, especially around sunset.
Where the trees are sprouting–below the skyways and criss-crossing pipes–are two sets of railroad tracks that turned through this narrow alleyway through the middle of the production line to drop off raw materials and pick up finished product.
The back of the neon sign before it was converted to LED lighting. The image is mirrored so it can be read.
Looking at the headframe for Shaft 3 from the tower for Shaft 1. Below is the roof of the Dry House. It was hard to remind myself that these building have been abandoned longer than I’ve been alive.
The conveyor between the shore and Dock 2. Note the gap in the aerial walkway that used to connect Dock 4 to the rest of the complex.
The main street of the ghost town is also the maintenance road for the BNSF line that bisects Colmor.
A morning breeze pushes the last ice from the lake against Wisconsin Point.
The school (hospital) campus was expansive.
The top three floors were removed from the top of the Temple Opera Block (right). If you have a sharp eye, you can see the outlines of some of the old floors on the shared wall of the Orpheum (left). For a time, the front of the building held a bus stop.
Daisy Mill could accept shipments from water, rail, and truck at one time. Now everything comes and goes by rail.
The pitch of the roof is more typical for areas with lots of snow—not the border of Ohio and Kentucky. So, I assume this roofline accommodated some equipment inside for trains—note the tracks.
Heavy industrial looks good in cotton candy pink.
A single cloud makes its way to Buffington Harbor and Lake Michigan from the quiet backroads of the plant.
The moon highlights the contrails over the engine house in the middle of the night. Foreground light painted.
The truck scale is closed at Lena, MB.
“Man has set for himself the goal of conquering the world but in the processes loses his soul.” Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian writer and historian.
Looking out upon Mill City through the lens of FLOUR, highlighted in pink and low clouds. This sign has recently been converted into LED lighting.
I wonder what this guy is thinking, walking through the complex.
The topmost roof of the hospital is covered in antennae and includes a star that faced the rest of the complex, now demolished.
One of my favorite night views of Fort Snelling’s so-called Upper Post, taken between snowstorms.
A great lakes freighter slowly passes SK Wheat Pool 4 with ‘The Sleeping Giant’ in the background. Arista 100.
A rail maintenance building. I liked the color of the tree against the peeling red paint.
In this ghost town where there were brick, wooden, and dirt-brick buildings, the latter fared the best by far.
A facade that tells the story of demolition and neglect. The sign on the garage door indicates that if one finds themselves there, that they enter the buildings at their own risk. If only property owners in the US took this philosophy!
The modern shaft stands above the north side of Gilman.
I was squatting overnight in one of the buildings and woke up with the sunrise. This is what I woke up to.
On the dark side of the workhouse at sunset, you can almost see where the walls used to be. Kodak Portra 160/Mamiya 6.
The Algosteel crew strikes a pose while heading through Superior Entry toward Allouez
The end of Dock 5 is warped and bent from a rail accident that left some ore cars swinging like a stringy wrecking ball into the end of the superstructure and accompanying stair. The stairs are still navigable, but it wasn’t recommended by the CN workers that were with me.
A panoramic view of the sintering plant’s gas plant (?). Everyone who visits must get a picture of these rusty smokestacks!
The purpose of the concentrator was to separate the gold and silver-rich ore from the waste rock. You can tell from the design that the process relies heavily on gravity.
Near Howardsville, Colorado, the Animas River gets quite wide. This is near the Little Nation Mill, which is worth a stop if you’re traveling north from SIlverton. It’s also near the former Gold King Mine, which “blew” in 2015 and flooded the Animas River with toxic mine water.
Delmar #4 is like two elevators in one, in capacity and design.
Gopher Ordnance Works, aka the U-Lands, is a landscape where roots and boughs break apart concrete and steel.
Looking out of the labs at the company garages.
You first.
A broken signal light that would indicate to incoming engineers and brakemen the status of the dock deck. The streetlight-style lighting is a retrofit; originally the top of the dock would be lit by strings of lights suspended by towers on each side of the deck… a poor system according to the workers at Allouez who had the same lights.
Looking through Workhouse A from the top of a silo.
Looking toward the old power house, right below one of its arteries.
The layout and design of the buildings reminded me strongly of a brewery or distillery. To the right you can see some of the retrofits by the first lumber company to buy the buildings, in the 1970s.
Boards on the window are like rings on a tree, if you know how to read abandonments.
Looking out across the elevator row from Portland Huron’s roof. Don’t you love the color of the sky?
A cloud moves across the attic in front of the window. How? A photographer’s secret.
This is what the mine shops look like from the road between Gaastra, MI and Rogers Location (formerly Bates, MI). The community was renamed for the mine, probably under the heavy influence of M.A. Hanna.
One of the covered rail loading docks. All of them were overgrown and rust-clad.
Looking toward Old Taylor Distillery from the roof of Old Crow.
The parking lot is in better condition than most of the complex. The left building is the lab.
The top of Dock 4 was too dangerous to explore, but this panorama gives you an idea of the view (and how rotten the wood was).
Some sort of materials handling building, judging by the construction.
Minnesota Power’s Taconite Harbor power station, as seen through the ship loading control room windows.
Colleen on the roof.
Taken at a junction in the tube world.
Shadows of distant power lines are carried to the concrete by street lights.
This bridge over Eagle River is beautiful.
A taste of Superior culture.
One night, I camped behind the sugar mill. You can tell be the clouds that a cold front was moving out—it was a hot day.
A little cloud passes over the Five-Stack powerplant ruins, like a puff of smoke.
This tree caught my eye. Note the bench swing near it. Portra 160.
Sunrise over Mill Hell, and all of Kurth’s various skyways. The elevators in the foreground date to the mid-1920s, Electric Steel is behind and is a little earlier than that.
Van Dyke Cab Company and Yellow Cab served the terminal in lieu of a streetcar loop downtown, which was planned but never built.
Looking toward Sleeping Giant from the workhouse.
Near the guard post protecting the launch pad at the Duluth BOMARC is an orange windsock.
Like a grave marker, a single post remembers where Dock 3 stood on the bay.
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.
Standing next to the now-demolished records room.
One of the older buildings on the site, this is an old power house that provided electricity to the plant. I spent some time walking around it and believe it was fired with coal gas but had a diesel backup installed later.
Some of the earlier buildings were dressed up with brick facades.
A full harbor on a hot summer evening, just after twilight, as seen from atop the castle walls.
Looking at The Windy City from the top of the coal tower. The pond you see is the former ACME Coke coal yard.
This big rusty sphere hides behind the incomplete 5-stack.
The sun unzipped the clouds. Mist blew across the harbor.
The offices for the Five Roses elevator have long been boarded. To the left you can see the Manitoba Pool Elevator slogan, “Service at Cost”, meaning they would not make profit off farmers and dues.
SWP4-A on the left and Viterra C on the right in a 90-degree panorama.
The exterior of the factory is unassuming
…a better view of the huge tailings boom stretching outside of the tailings pond.
On the National Mine property are two shafts, both serving the same workings. This one seems to have gotten some upgrades in the 1960s, judging from the condition of the metal.
A typical dwelling in San Luis. I could not tell if it was occupied, but most of the town is abandoned.
This sign was important when trains ran the length of the elevator.
When I first saw Ogilvie’s from the ground, I promised myself to look back when i found my way into this little pitched outcropping which seemed to have the best view of Thunder Bay I could imagine. It turns out, though, that there is no floor in that section; it is just extended machine access! Oh well. Mount McKay in the background in the last light.
Looking from the brewhouse at the death of its sister building, across Minnehaha.
Wyoming has Montana’s ‘big sky’ reputation truly challenged.
This old Jetta did more offroading than your average lifted tinted loud-exhaust pickup.
The top of the grain handler of Ogilvie’s. The flagpole serves as a lightning rod. In fact, I would not be surprised if that was its primary purpose.
Don’t you love the shape of the house on the right?
A quick vertical panorama taken on my back at the sweet spot of a great summer sunset. On the skylight is the torch-cut catwalk that used to link the outside of the smokestacks that vented the cupolas.
The porch of the Gustavson House with the southern San Juan range in the background. Bring your own rocking chair…
Counter-weighted ore cars alternately filled and emptied to feed Furnace 7. Honestly, though, the corner-mounted cranes are sexier in my opinion. Note the trees growing from the stacks.
Here, the concentrated gold (and silver, and zinc, I would guess) would be loaded into trucks bound for the smelter.
Looking at the concrete headframe from street level. Acros 100 in Pentax 67
This electric Wellman crane was added to extract coal from ships for the power plant that Erie built beside their dock. Now, with the advent of self-unloading boats, it’s been replaced by a funnel and conveyor belt.
The southernmost houses in Gilman are seen through the pines on the right, near the tram stop.
The roof was in bad shape, but too beautiful to avoid. This is the spot were I used to study medieval Latin.
During the Cold War, the Air Force used the radar station to train bombardiers in radar-guided ordinance.
“Crunch, crunch, crunch,” said the ground. “I know,” I replied.
Tornadic fronts duel over the retired missile launcher.
The rust garden’s brick centerpiece contrasts the muted winter Kentucky palette.
A tower above Minneapolis that few people see.
The perimeter fence still holds strong, 50 years after it was put up.
The tallest dock structure is an equipment elevator that connects the many dock levels.
Looking out of the brewhouse toward the river.
Like a railgun pointed at the Rockies… the boom would direct tailings–junk rock–outside of the dredge pond.
The first time I saw Buffalo Central Terminal was from a westbound Empire Builder. In the foreground you can see the rows of platforms.
The Barker turning around before it backed into Tac Harbor to unload coal for Minnesota Power.
A wide view of the poor house. Look at the smokestack and elevator shaft, which show the former roofline.
Looking out from a hallway on the third floor where a ceiling and roof should be. I could not stand in the room, as the floor had collapsed into the basement, but I could put my camera out at arm’s length and fire a few pictures upward, which is how I came away with this image!
This ruin was once the Toltec Mine, a producing gold and silver claim that operated into the 1940s.
Much of the circa-1950s buildings remain with few alterations, such as these long boring sheet metal ruststicks.
The taller of the two smokestacks on site. Note the crack around its crown.
Another perfect Indianan sunset alights like a bird on the tops of the vent houses and tree-packed smokestacks.
Taken several years before the tornado story when the weather, and the condition of the buildings, were nice.
“To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee,
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.”
― Emily Dickinson
The ghost town of Lauder, Manitoba. It’s seen better days, but I bet the TV reception on the flatlands is great.
The Big Dipper brought its friends into view, and the best seat is 80-feet up.
The top of the docks are so rotten in places that you can see the lake through the boards. In the foreground you can see the controls for the chutes, which work on a clutch.
Originally, this part of the dock was reserved for the weather station.
There is a flipped tram car about a third of the way down the cliff.
The Osborn Block (front) and the Twohy (rear) at sunset. In the distance, you can almost make out Globe Elevators. One of my favorite photos of 2013.
On my second or third trip, the cross had broken in the wind.
The powerplant and its dedicated water tower supplied steam for heating and mechanical work.
A damaged roof channeled rain onto the adobe walls, cutting them in half. In the distance, a preserved house and the ruins of the Colmor School.
As the Barker steamed past the dock and island, the sunset casts the shadow of the Taconite Harbor receiving trestle on the boat. Through the fog, you can see some of the islands that were joined into a breakwater.
The Clipper was one of the most popular Packards, but its production was cut short by WWII. Had they produced the car instead of Rolls Royce plane engines I imagine there would might be driving a Packard today, rather than a Ford.
A sizable crane on the corner of the engine house still swings out.
This heavy door opens directly into the missile vault and was used to load and unload the missile erector.
2013. As part of the Head House’s facelift, it’s gotten new windows. However, you can now still see where the conveyor-way connected this building with the elevators behind it in the upper right of the image.
Coming to an inspirational poster near you… what should it read? ADVENTURE AWAITS? Don’t hang posters. Go outside.
Looking north from the east portal of the tunnel… a beautiful place. Wilderness. Mamiya 6/Portra 160
The roof had structures bigger than most buildings in South Bend.
The side of a launcher, with outbuildings in the background. You can see the tracks where the roof would open before launch.
San Luis may not be a ghost town, but it’s aspiring by all indications. Luckily, it’s close enough to Cuba, NM to hang onto life, unlike the other ghost towns down the road.
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.
Sidewalks to a boarded barracks, each making the other obsolete in the night.
Looking out at the town water tower (which I love) from the sugar mill (which I also love).
The fantastic red elevator that is Pool #61, built 1928.
The building is winking.
I didn’t test the rungs, but I bet the view was incredible.
SFAAP’s iconic smokestacks. You’d notice if you drove past this on the highway.
The laundry building, where many of the tunnels came to an end. It looks very East Coast industrial to me.
Old boathouses near the dock.
35mm Film, Expired. An abandoned swath of NAD is landlocked by soybean fields.
Looking through the loading platform of Frontenac Mine toward Black Hawk. In 1900, you would see Druid Mine on the left and Aduddell on the right.
The valley is full of rocky peaks that stand out from the winding creeks, which only truly run after storms. It is a very beautiful place.
A side view of the oven pusher from the ground. The tallest coal bunker looks tiny in the distance, though on the scale of the factory it’s practically on top of me as I’m taking the picture.
A divot to let more light and air into the building.
Looking across the spired rooftop of the Kirkbride building. In the foreground is a fire chute that contains a metal spiral slide designed to evacuate patients in case of a fire. Note the ironwork on the chimney.
When I see this picture, I imagine that I am an ant exploring a mushroom farm.
The tailings boom is the first and last thing you see when approaching the mountaintop shipwreck.
A shallow creek traces Illinois Gulch toward the Chain O’ Mines mill. Ball mills are laid out in the sun.
Soft rain on Vulcan’s ashy pyre… Both of these peaks are dead volcanos, too hard to be totally washed away by storms. As a result, they seem to rise dramatically from the flat valley.
The last of four radar domes on the base.