List of ghost towns in Maryland explained

The following is an incomplete list of ghost towns in Maryland. Ghost towns can include sites in various states of disrepair and abandonment. Some sites no longer have any trace of civilization and have reverted to pasture land or empty fields. Other sites are unpopulated but still have standing buildings. Some sites may even have a sizable, though small population, but there are far fewer citizens than in its grander historic past.

Many ghost towns can be located in the Appalachian counties, particularly Garrett County. During the 18th and 19th century, a number of "boom towns" were formed to participate in the flourishing coal, railroad, and iron industries. Towards the late 19th century, the resources in the region had begun to deplete, and the onset of the Great Depression finally killed many of the industrial towns.^[1]

Classification

Barren site

• Sites no longer in existence
• Sites that have been destroyed
• Covered with water
• Reverted to pasture
• May have a few difficult to find foundations/footings at most

Neglected site

• • Only rubble left
  • All buildings uninhabited
  • Roofless building ruins
  • Some buildings or houses still standing, but majority are roofless

Abandoned site

• Building or houses still standing
• Buildings and houses all abandoned
• No population, except caretaker
• Site no longer in existence except for one or two buildings, for example old church, grocery store

Semi abandoned site

• Building or houses still standing
• Buildings and houses largely abandoned
• few residents
• many abandoned buildings
• Small population

Historic community

• Building or houses still standing
• Still a busy community
• Smaller than its boom years
• Population has decreased dramatically, to one fifth or less.

List by County

• Old Town Mall, a largely abandoned commercial district in the center of Baltimore.
• Wagner's Point, an industrial area of Baltimore which had all residents forcibly relocated in the late 1990s for environmental concerns.^[2]

• Daniels (Partially in Howard County), an old milling town on the Patapsco River.^[3]
• Relay, formerly a booming railroad town which declined sharply and today contains only a handful of residents and none of its historic landmarks.
• Warren, which was flooded during the creation of Loch Raven Reservoir^[4]

• Calverton, the first county seat of Calvert County, which is today a barren site.^[5]
• Wilson, which appeared on maps as late as 1901.

• Conowingo. The original town was flooded by the creation of Conowingo Reservoir, and the residents relocated to a location nearby.
• Frenchtown, formerly a hub for steam boat travel, which was rendered obsolete by the Chesapeake and Delaware Canal and then later by railroads.
• United States Naval Training Center Bainbridge, a naval recruit training center that was operational from 1942 to 1976.

• Port Tobacco Village, once the second largest town in Maryland, by 2010 it had declined to the smallest incorporated town in Maryland.^{[6] [7]}

• Harmony Grove, a former milling town which was abandoned in the early 20th century and widely demolished in the 1960s-1970s for a highway expansion.^[8]
• Monocacy. Considered to be the oldest settlement in Western Maryland, the site of Monocacy was lost completely after being abandoned in the early 19th century, and has never been found despite a multitude of historical evidence it existed.^[9]

• Altamont^[10]
• Bloomington
• Blooming Rose, first settled in 1791.^[11]
• Davis
• Dodson
• Floyd^[12]
• Frankville, notable for the 1876 death of Francis Thomas.
• Gleason^[13]
• Gorman
• Kempton, a coal town on the border of West Virginia.
• Kendall, an old logging town.^[14]
• Schell (partially in Mineral County, West Virginia)
• Selbysport
  • Shallmar Skipnish
• Thomas
• Vindex
• Wallman
• Wilson (partially in Grant County, West Virginia)

• Lapidum

• Daniels (Partially in Baltimore County)

• Good Luck

• Broad Creek

• Marion Station
• Tulls Corner, a nearly extinct community near Marion Station.^[15]

• St. Mary's City, a former colonial town that has been replaces by a state-run historic area and St. Mary's College of Maryland.^[16]

• Fort Ritchie, a former military base which closed in 1998. The last residents were evicted in 2017.^[17]
• Four Locks, found in the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal National Historical Park.^[18]
• Weverton. Although there is a current Weverton, it's not located on the original site.

• Sinepuxent

See also

• List of counties in Maryland
  • Baltimore and Annapolis Railroad

Notes and References

1. Web site: VIII . 2023-02-06 . www.heritage.umd.edu.
2. Robert C. Keith (2005). Baltimore harbor: a pictorial history, p. 75. The Johns Hopkins University Press. Retrieved 2010-05-17
3. Web site: Mill Town History; Daniels, Maryland. The Historical Marker Database. 4 November 2015.
4. News: Rumor or Fact? A Town Under Loch Raven Reservoir. November 6, 2019. March 4, 2019. Baltimore Magazine . Ron . Cassie.
5. Web site: 2001-02-13 . Calvert County Historic District Design Guidelines . 2023-02-21 . calvertcountymd.gov . 3.
6. http://www.charlescounty.org/PGM/planning/publications/demotrends/vol5_2.pdf Census 2000.
7. Donald G. Shomette, Lost Towns of Tidewater Maryland, Tidewater Publishers, Centreville, MD, 2000, pp. 193-245.
8. Web site: Maryland Historical Trust . F-3-108 Hamony Grove survey District . 2023-02-11 . mht.maryland.gov . 2.
9. News: Gordon. Paul. The archaeological needle. Frederick Gazette. 13 April 1998.
10. Web site: Smith . Jason . Ghost Towns of Maryland . April 30, 2022 . United States Ghost Towns . 20 February 2021 . en-us.
11. Web site: Whilbr - Western Maryland Historical Library . 2023-02-12 . www.whilbr.org.
12. Web site: Marshall . R.B. . 1914 . RESULTS OF SPIRIT LEVELING IN MARYLAND 1896 TO 1911, INCLUSIVE . 2023-02-19 . pubs.usgs.gov . 45, 53.
13. Web site: Maryland's Coal Heritage Trail . 2023-02-16 . www.mountaindiscoveries.com.
14. Web site: The Kendall Lumber Co. of Garrett County, Md . Packard . Aaron . May 22, 2011 . Nova Numismatics . October 26, 2013.
15. Web site: TULL'S CORNER, MARYLAND, An excerpt from "Quindocqua, Maryland; Indian Country", by Woodrow T. Wilson, published in 1980. 2009-01-29. Tulls Corner, Maryland. Woodrow T. Wilson.
16. "St. Marys: A When-Did Timeline", pages 6 through 27, by Janet Butler Haugaard, Executive Editor and writer, St. Mary's College of Maryland with Susan G. Wilkinson, Director of Marketing and Communications, Historic St. Mary's City Commission and Julia A. King, Associate Professor of Anthropology, St. Mary's College of Maryland Archives Web site: Archived copy . 2014-03-20 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20140221145632/http://www.smcm.edu/archives/documents/StMarysWhenDidTimeline.pdf . 2014-02-21 .
17. Web site: Last of Fort Ritchie residents leaving this week.
18. Web site: Carbaugh . Trent . The Ghost Town of Four Locks . 2023-02-13 . candocanal.org.