Picher, Oklahoma is a modern day ghost town. It was formerly a major national center of lead and zinc mining. Over a century of unrestricted subsurface excavation left Picher with groundwater contamination and toxic metal-contaminated chat heaps. Picher was declared uninhabitable and efforts to evacuate initiated. In 2009, efforts to close the town began. There were only six homes and one business remaining as of January 2011 because the residents refused to leave.
This photo is of the abandoned Mining Museum taken February 2014 with one of our film cameras. It just seemed fitting to capture this ghost town on film instead of digital. Walking around the town with the abandoned businesses and homes was certainly sad and a bit creepy at the same time.
