Yerington, Future Ghost Town

Today we went out to look around Yerington as a possible place to live. I remembered it from years ago as a cute, small community tucked back out of the way.

It still is today, but since the HUGE, old, open-pit abandoned copper mine got designated a SuperFund cleanup site years ago, Yerington has been slowly dying since then. It's a shame too, since it was a lovely valley with agriculture all around--mostly cattle and alfalfa fields. It struck us as so odd the day we were there, and the home prices so low, that we checked it out online.

Wow. Literally every superbad, toxic thing you can think of is polluting Yerington. Right down to about 6 different kinds of radioactive horrors. It's in the ground, water and air. They even have to have bottled water shipped in for some of the residents.

Move there with a 12 year old child? Thank you, NO.

But our trip there wasn't entirely wasted, we got to see the town in it's not-so-arrested decay and the few people still there, and at least it gave us information on where NOT to look for a home.

The city water tanks...

The old drive-in...

One of the doors of the concession stand was kicked open, we didn't go in but I stuck the camera in and snapped a couple of pics. My guess on the age of the popcorn maker and freezer unit would be about mid-1960's.

Further into town was this awesome old abandoned brick building with two old gas pumps still standing--we were astounded some jerk hadn't made off with them yet.

People had even carved their names into the old, soft brick on the front of the buil--

HEY! Now that's just plain uncalled for.

We were puttering around, checking out this cool old building and telling the kid how the old gas pumps worked (marveling at 49 cents a gallon), when a man in the little park across the street called out to us, "Don't forget to check out the lady in the window!"

Huh? We looked up. And damned if there wasn't a lady in the window!

She is a happy accident, formed by the way the window broke. Very cool!

The corner sidewalk, still with it's street name inlaid.

We wave our thanks to the man and continue down the street.

Nothing on this old place is square anymore.

The last thing we see is one of those houses where the people have created weird and wonderful yard art. I can't decide if I like SpiderTurkey or RailroadDeadGhostCow best.

All in all, a fun day, even though it left us sad for Yerington.