This is going to be the last weekend that I get with Noelle and Sierra for a while, as all my seasonal staff finish their seasons after this coming week. I wanted to do a trip to celebrate Noelle's upcoming birthday and I know how much she enjoys the Black Hills, and so we made the drive up to Custer this morning. It's Having lived and worked at Wind Cave National Park for several seasons, it can be difficult to find new things to explore. I found a place we'd never been before online, the Spokane Ghost Town.
After a brief restroom stop at Wind Cave, we drove through Custer State Park and up the southernmost section of the Iron Mountain Road. Soon enough we found ourselves at the junction with Playhouse Road. We turned right and soon enough found the gated Forest Road 330. We parked the car alongside Playhouse Road so we wouldn't block the gate and started to walk to the Spokane Ghost Town. Spokane was founded in 1890 to support mining activities in the local area. While gold was what the miners originally sought, mines in the area produced silver, copper, zinc, graphite and mica. By 1940, the mining boom had waned and the town was largely abandoned.
We started our hike by bypassing a gate on Forest Road 330.
An interesting sticker for the USS Greeneville was attached to a post there.
Interestingly, we lived in the ship's namesake town of Greeneville, Tennessee for three years. After a short walk on the forest road, we started to see the first of the old town's buildings.
While there are still a handful of buildings still standing, there seem to be more old cars to look at than structures. Nearby to the building was the first cluster of old, abandoned vehicles.
There were also a few good climbing rocks for Sierra to scramble around on.
From the climbing rock, we made our way over to another cluster of cars, including one labeled as "The Beast."
From there, we bypassed a structure that had completely collapsed and then headed over to a small wood structure next to a concrete foundation. There was a really deep (and dangerous) hole here.
We picked up the road again for a short time
and followed it to some more paths that led to interesting destinations, including a cistern and what I think may have been a root cellar or explosives storage area.
We then made our way to a solitary grave. It belongs to James Shepard, who was murdered over a mining claim.
As we headed a bit deeper into the woods, we found a large structure, possibly a house.
From this point we backtracked towards where we had entered the ghost town. We stopped at another relatively large structure. Again, it appeared to be a house, though I'm not sure what purpose it served.
From there we returned to the car to complete our drive of the Iron Mountain Road.
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