Rust and Ruins 2
by George Buxbaum
Title
Rust and Ruins 2
Artist
George Buxbaum
Medium
Photograph
Description
Rust and Ruins in Rhyolite, Nevada. An old mining town, Rhyolite is north of Death Valley National Park and just 5 miles outside Beatty, Nevada. The town was founded in 1904 and by 1907 even had electricity. The financial panic of 1907 took its toll on the town and businesses started to shut down. Then, the mines started to play out and by 1916 the power and light company had shut down and the people had moved on.
The town citizens had an active social life including baseball games, dances, basket socials, whist parties, tennis, a symphony, Sunday school picnics, basketball games, Saturday night variety shows at the opera house and pool tournaments. There were hotels, stores, a school for 250 children, an ice plant, two electric plants, foundries and machine shops and even a miner's union hospital. In 1906 Countess Morajeski opened the Alaska Glacier Ice Cream Parlor to the delight of the local citizenry. That same year an enterprising miner, Tom T. Kelly, built a Bottle House out of 50,000 beer and liquor bottles.
This old truck sits out in the elements near, the old Bottle House, just rusting away while in the background the remnants of a once thriving mining town continue to deteriorate. Soon the old truck and the town of Rhyolite will be completely gone and just a memory.
Uploaded
March 22nd, 2020
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Viewed 1,739 Times - Last Visitor from Beverly Hills, CA on 04/19/2024 at 6:39 PM
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Comments (1)
Heidi Fickinger
Great image George. Somewhere in my black and white negatives from nearly 25 years ago, I have photographs of this truck and other old abandoned vehicles in Death Valley. It is amazing how the desert continues to preserve them and slow the decomposition process down. Aloha
George Buxbaum replied:
Thank you Heidi. This truck has been moved since I took this image several years ago. It is no longer near the old Bottle House.
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