20 vintage photos show what life was like in America's small towns 100 years ago

Business Insider

20-05-2025

Between the early 1900s and the 1940s, Oatman and nearby Gold Road were Arizona's biggest gold producers, and the town used to be a bustling center with over 10,000 inhabitants.During the 2023 census, it had a population of just 102 people.Today, the "lively ghost town" is defined by its streets of historic buildings, burros on the streets, and people wearing old-timey clothing and gunfighter costumes, as reported by Legends of America.
The town was founded in 1881 and was named for O.H. Manning, a politician.The town of 1,500 is about 2 miles long and 2 miles wide, and its Main Street was paved in 1915, as reported by a community website.
The town was established on land taken from the Cheyenne and Arapaho people. According to the Oklahoma Historical Society, at the end of the 19th century, a general merchandise store with a post office was established nearby. The name of the town honors a postal employee, Wayne W. Cordell.
In 1905, a prospector found gold, and within a year, its population had reached 4,000, Travel Nevada reported.Today, about 125 people reside in the town, and residents often refer to their community as a "living ghost town," per Nevada's state tourism agency.
Though the town enjoyed decades of prosperity for the resources provided by Grasshopper Creek, by the 1930s, few residents remained.In the following decade, the local school had to close down due to a lack of students, effectively turning the once-prosperous town into a ghost town, per Legends of America.The now-abandoned town where gold was first discovered in the state is now part of a state park where dilapidated buildings are preserved.
In 1925, Dayton, Tennessee, became famous for the Scopes Trial. In 1925, a Dayton high school science teacher, John T. Scopes, was tried and found guilty for teaching Charles Darwin's theory of evolution in what became known as the Scopes Trial.
Fleischmanns, New York, was a vacation town for those looking to escape the New York City heat. Farmers discovered they could make money from people leaving the city, and hotels and guest houses popped up throughout the town.Today, the town houses around 205 people, according to 2023 census estimates.
Provincetown, Massachusetts, began as a fishing and whaling community. In 1914, the Provincetown Art Association and Museum was founded by a group of prominent local artists. They worked with local businesses to create an art collection and educate the public in the arts. The town is known for being the 1620 landing site of the Mayflower.
Lumber operations are pictured in Crossett, Arkansas, in the 1920s. The town was named after Edward S. Crossett, a lumber entrepreneur.
Stillwater, Minnesota, was incorporated in 1854 and also began as a lumbering town. The town "had all the ingredients for a lumbering town," as reported by the Washington County Historical Society. The town features rivers connecting the small community to the pine forests of northern Minnesota and Wisconsin, and still waters that allowed for the raft assembly industry to flourish locally.In 2011, Forbes named it as one of America's prettiest towns.
Holy City, California, was established by a cult leader and white supremacist, William E. Riker, in 1919. Holy City was created not as a religious oasis, as the name would indicate, but instead as "a commune and tourist trap created in the 1920s by a white-supremacist huckster," the San Francisco Chronicle wrote.The Chronicle also reported that Holy City was reduced to "a few derelict buildings" after facing fire, neglect, and a new freeway that cut off the compound from major roads. Mercury News reported in 2016 that the town was purchased after a decade on the market by Robert and Trish Duggan, billionaire Scientologists.
Historians estimate that the ancestors of Taos Pueblo people built their living structures, as well as pottery and ceremonial buildings, as far back as 1000 AD, according to Taos.org.
Wrangell, Alaska, pictured below in the early to mid-1900s, was discovered by the Tlingit tribe. The Native Alaskan populations remained isolated until the early 1800s, per Wrangell's website. Lt. Dionysius Zarembo, a Russian-American ship commander, landed on present-day Wrangell in 1833. It is the only city in Alaska to be ruled by four nations and under three flags — Tlingit, Russia, England, and the United States — according to the town's website.
South Pass City, Wyoming, was founded as a gold mining town. It was later abandoned.