In March, I packed a suitcase and took off on a road trip to Big Bend National Park. Driving through the West Texas desert, I couldn’t help noticing the small patches of civilization scattered amongst miles of barren highway- places that feel like they’re slowly being left behind.
One of these lost places was a town called Shafter. A green road marker labeled it a “ghost town,” but it was once the largest silver-mining hub in Texas. Now the whole place was little more than a church, a graveyard and some ruins overlooked by the mountains on the horizon. Population: 33, and falling every year.
And towns like Shafter aren’t disappearing by accident…