Montana has an extraordinary number of remarkably intact ghost towns - possibly because of forward-thinking folks, possibly because there just aren't that many people around to ransack them.
Any tour of southwestern Montana should include some of these well-preserved sites.
Bannack
During the annual Bannack Days celebration, it's hard to believe this is a ghost town. People wander the boardwalks in period costume, gunfights break out, cowboys trot down the street on horseback and tie up in front of the blacksmith's shop.
A bearded Kevin Heaney, in jeans, flannel shirt and cowboy hat, stretches his legs on the deck behind the visitors center while his video, "Ghost Towns of Montana," plays inside to a packed house - all 20 chairs are taken.
Heaney loves Montana's ghost towns, especially Bannack.
A native of now-empty Granite, where his great-great-grandmother ran a boarding house, Heaney trailed his grandfather all around southwestern Montana area when he was a kid. Now, at 45, he brings his own children to see the remnants of Montana's glory days.
Bannack is particularly picturesque.
The buildings are in an exceptional state of repair, and the echoes of ghosts still haunt them.
It was here that the elected sheriff, Henry Plummer, and his gang found a home base for their crime spree. It's said they murdered more than 100 people and robbed countless others in eight months. Finally, after a particularly large payroll robbery, a vigilante group made up of citizens from Bannack and nearby Virginia City (who called themselves "The Innocents") gathered forces and hunted down the criminals, hanging Plummer and his cohorts for their crimes.
Garnet
This boom town wasn't built to last. Yet, oddly enough, it's one of the best-preserved ghost towns of the West. Much of its original downtown, including the hotel, and many miners cabins still stand.
Ranger Dwight Geppart loves to tell the town's story to visitors.
Garnet, tucked into the Garnet Mountains northeast of Missoula, was born in the 1860s when miners migrated north from the played out placer mines of Colorado and California. Its hills were full of gold-bearing quartz.
When placer (hydraulic) mining waned here, miners headed to nearby Philipsburg and Helena to hunt for silver. But with the repeal of the Sherman Silver Purchase Act in 1893, gold once again became the mineral of choice. Only now, it had to be mined by the sweat-intensive hard-rock method.
Originally named Mitchell after Dr. Armistead Mitchell, who built the first stamp mill here in the early 1890s, it later became Garnet, named for the semiprecious stones abundant in the area, Geppart says.
Mining brought the usual mix of people - miners, prostitutes and support businesses - like saloons. And it brought 600 Chinese immigrants.
By 1898, there were 1,000 people, 13 saloons, four hotels - "ladies were only allowed in the drawing room," Geppart says - four stores, three livery stables, two barbers shops, a butcher shop, candy shop, assay office, a union hall, and a school. No church. But traveling preachers often held Sunday services in the Miners Union Hall.
Oddly enough, there's no town cemetery. It's believed that if anyone got that sick, they were taken into Deer Lodge, Anaconda or Missoula. But that doesn't explain what happened to those who died in town.
Unlike many mining towns, Garnet drew families, who lived in one-room cabins.
Quilting bees and community dances were common, as well as barbecues.
By 1905, most of the gold had been found, and the population had dwindled to about 150.
A 1912 fire had destroyed a good portion of the business district, so by the 1920s, Garnet was a ghost town - except for Frank Davey, who lived in the mercantile until 1946, always hoping the people would come back, Geppart says.
In 1934, when the price of gold doubled to $32 an ounce, a few miners moved back, but they left again during World War II.
Only scavengers and curiosity seekers visited the town until 1969, when the Bureau of Land Management put four part-time volunteers on site to protect and preserve it.
Since then, the BLM has helped stabilize many of the remaining buildings, with the help of individual sponsors. Now, the BLM, the Garnet Preservation Association and the Garnet Mining Corp. co-own most of the property and operate it as a tourist attraction.
Virginia City
More famous than Garnet or Bannack, Virginia City doesn't technically qualify as a ghost town.
It began in June 1863, when the first log cabins appeared (some still stand). By fall there were 10,000 people living there. It boomed to 35,000 people in its heyday, then dropped to about 150 at its low point.
Virginia City was the territorial capital from 1865 to 1876, was the first incorporated town in Montana, had the first schools and newspapers in the territory, and claimed many more "firsts."
"The main reason Virginia City survives is because of the Bovey family," Ogden says. In the early 1940s, Charles and Sue Bovey began buying property in the town and restoring it.
Listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and probably the best-preserved old Western town in the country, Virginia City was safe until Charles Bovey died several years ago. His son, Ford Bovey, is now trying to sell Virginia City. Asking price? It's a modest $6.5 million. So far, there are no takers. *****
Additional Information
If you go
Here are some sources for planning a trip to southwestern Montana's ghost towns.
Bannack State Park: Montana Fish, Wildlife and Parks Dept., (406) 834-3413
Ghost Town Adventures: Kevin Heaney, tour guide, (406) 563-3357
Garnet: Garnet Preservation Association, (406) 329-3914 or (406) 244-5289
Garnet Historical Tours: Horseback tours of the area around the ghost town, (406) 244-5523
Virginia City: Virginia City Preservation Alliance, (406) 843-5513
Travel Montana: For a Montana visitors guide, call (800) 847-4868 or (800) 541-1447