State atlas · filed under MN
Ghost Towns of Minnesota
Minnesota's ghosts follow the Iron Range's shifting pits — towns physically moved or closed as mines expanded — plus cutover timber camps and prairie hamlets the railroads consolidated away.
737 sites surveyed across Minnesota — 1 charted with full records so far, entered by year of settlement. The rest are awaiting verification.
Survey note
The federal place-name archive records 737 vanished or historical sites in Minnesota — ghost towns, mining camps, townsites, and railroad stops. We chart them a few at a time, as the records can be verified. Every mark on this map is a place that once had a name.
Society Pro
See Minnesota as the surveyors drew it, 1879 to 1919
238 USGS survey sheets from those years cover Minnesota. Pro lays them over today's map with a swipe between then and now, and adds every mine feature, lost place and mineral site the federal record holds for the state.
The full survey ledger
Every vanished town the federal archive records in Minnesota — each with its own record page, verified and expanded over time.