There's just something about abandoned towns that fills our hearts with an odd sense of pity and loss. Though the city that's been long left behind has no real attachment to us personally, we always tend to have our own imaginations force our own towns into the photos we view.
We imagine our own homes, long abandoned, slowly being overtaken by nature. We imagine our new cars being hidden away by the forest, covered in moss and rust as the years slide by. Like the Pharos of Alexandria, the Greek Parthenon, or the once mighty civilizations of the past; we are all drawn to "lost" cultures. From Atlantis to the town below, the ruins of the past remind us of the ephemeral nature of all things. Like Ozymandias, we want our works to have meaning, but sometimes the best laid plans can still result in nothing.
What was once a mighty empire can just as easily disappear into the footnotes of history. The firmament of time helps to put things in perspective, and to find these "ghost towns" within our own young nation is even more intriguing.
The tiny town of Lovell, OK shares in those mysterious ghosts of the past. As we walk through the ruins of a once prosperous boomtown we can almost hear the whispers of now nameless people. The loves shared, the secrets kept, the promises broken, and the lives lived have all drifted into our imaginations. Please take a look below on some of the heartbreakingly beautiful images of this small, forgotten town.
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Lovell, OK was originally called Perth and was developed as a town soon after the Western lands opened up for settlement.
After the nearby railroad opened in 1902 the small town grew, it quickly became a booming agricultural trade center.
In 1906, the name was changed to "Lovell" to honor the man who helped develop the whole town to begin with: James W. Lovell.
The town once had a bank, hotel, two cotton gins, multiple stores, shops, and cafes.
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Everything seemed to be going perfectly for this town.
The Lovell School opened in 1903 with an enrollment of nearly 200 inhabitants.
But then, in 1928, a terrible fire wiped out the entire East side of the main business section of the town.
After the fire, very little rebuilding was done to restore the city to its previous glory.
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Years ago, it is assumed that someone placed these old firetrucks into the ground as an art installation.
Similar to the Cadillac Ranch in Amarillo, TX, these buried trucks inspire a sense of sadness and loss to the once thriving city.
The Lovell school had its final day of class on May 17th, 1955, never to reopen its doors.
The city is just a ghost town now, nothing compared to what it used to be... And time keeps moving forward.
It's crazy that this city is actually sitting in the United States isn't it?
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