Arrested Decay

That is what they call the condition of the town of Bodie, California. Bodie is an honest to goodness Ghost town up in the Sierra Mountains, a couple of hours out of Tahoe, near Yosemite. Ghosts have played a big part in my experience lately and since it is coming up on Halloween it seems appropriate to talk about Bodie.

Bodie is a very interesting place. The building you see in the picture is an old store having its "decay arrested" by the make shift flying buttress support on the left. When it was a gold rush town in the mid 19th century there were ten thousand people living here. That included about 40 brothels, 65 saloons and a Chinatown with several opium dens. The town was so rough they averaged a killing a day. Only about one fifth of the buildings remain in this time warp. Just as the gold was running out a fire destroyed most of the town. People just walked away and left what was here.

It is very interesting to look into some of the houses and see what was left behind. It would have been difficult to carry much away. Even with an automobile it is quite a trek to get up the into the Sierras to find Bodie. Gold was the only lure for these people. There was a twenty-five year old man named James Cain who leased a small plot of land on the hill and started the Midnight Mining Company. In 90 days his mine recovered $90k in gold. The land owner wouldn't renew his lease. James Cain leveraged his fortune and became one of the richest men in Bodie. The summers get very hot and there are no trees for shade. The winters can get to 32 below zero. One of the other rich residents of Bodie was the man who ran the saw mill. The houses were so poorly constructed it required the consumption of lots of wood for heating. Small wonder that there was as much violence and killing.

Sandi and I toured Bodie with some friends we drove with to Tahoe. In one of the pictures I told my companions to strike a pose like ghosts since they were in the middle of a ghost town. I snapped the shot but it did not achieve the result I had hoped for. It was way too "show biz". It looked like a pose for the ghost of Bob Fossee. What did I expect... not sure.
As you were,
Jay