Metropolis Nevada, that is. Metropolis is now a ghost town (actually little more than a few deteriorating foundations and walls.) My wife and I headed out a while back to check it out and get some photos.
I took a bunch of pictures not just for the strangeness of the environment itself, but to use as reference for an upcoming project. Lots of cool crumbling structures and collapsing walls.
Metropolis is located about 12 miles Northwest of Wells, NV. It was started in 1911, and grew rapidly thanks to a promotional campaign by the Pacific Reclamation Company. The Bishop’s Creek Dam was built, and provided plenty of water, but in June of 1912, some farmers from Lovelock filed a lawsuit claiming that the dam interfered with their water rights downstream. The Pacific Reclamation Company was forced into receivership in 1913, and that was the beginning of the end of Metropolis.
By 1920, there were fewer than 100 people left in the town and on the nearby homesteads. On Sept. 11th, 1936, the 50 room hotel that had been the pride of Metropolis was destroyed by a fire.
The two main structures seen in my photos are from the remaining foundation of the hotel (the large tower in the center of it was the bank vault) and the building with the arched entrance was the school.
You can see the photos here.
Tags: My Photos
Cool pics Gooch! I searched for some photos of Metropolis in it’s hay-day, not a lot out there, but I did find a cool memoir brochure (PDF) created by Eleanor Holland who was a resident: http://www.wellsnevada.com/metropolisbrochure.pdf