Secret Abandoned Ghost Town Eagle Mountain | 400 Empty Homes In California

Hello: I can answer your questions: This was MY Home!!! We lived there 1960 for 4 years. It was the most beautiful place ever on the desert. We had LUSH green lawns, big tall trees, flowering bushes, paved streets, street lights, well built with AC homes that was owned and maintained by Kaiser. The schools were the best in the USA and our teachers were top in their fields. We had lots of activities, famous movie stars visiting, even Red Skelton's brother worked at the mine with my dad. And we had a good safe place to grow up in, good income, safe working conditions, and 'family' environments. IF they could bring it back to its glory days of beauty and Desert Center too! I would move back there in a heart beat! I miss Eagle Mountain. There is water underground, electric power still operational, a huge lake nearby too. Desert Center was the stopping point coming and going from AZ to CA for all traffic. It breaks my heart to see what time has taken away from its one time beauty. Most of the original families that lived there are gone now, my parent's generation, and a lot of my age group (60's+) are gone too. Our kids and grandkids have no connection to the town. As the drone panned over the community I got to see my house, my best friends' homes, the rec center, the elementary school, the high school, and the shopping area. I CRIED... again, my memories are so strongly attached to those buildings. I know others that see this will have their own memories and that is so wonderful. I pray that who bought this property will not destroy it, but instead bring it back to life... Blessings to all.

This looks like a great opportunity to house at least some of the thousands of homeless people living on California's streets. Bring them here with tools and supplies to refurbish their new-to-them houses, schedule food deliveries and no alcohol, drugs or drug paraphernalia. A remote rehab if you will.

My parents met in this town! They had moved to Oregon by the time I came along. My sister graduated from EMHS in '82. I've always been intrigued by this place. I visited the town in 2014. Rode my motorcycle out there. But I could only look at it from the front gate. Mom and dad are both gone now, but my sisters have some fond memories of the place.

I lived EM from 1956 to 1964 (I was born in Indio). Every day at noon the warning whistle would go off alerting when they blasted the mine. We left and moved to Alaska when I was 12 years old. Still in Alaska. We used to go back when visiting relatives in Blythe, CA. Used to be allowed to walk through the town, but not the last time I was there. Have a lot of photos (color slides of course).

I lived in Eagle Mountain as a kid from 1971 until summer of 1979. It was a great place to live, a true sense of community. The people were great, have maintained friendships with some for close to 50 years. Many are dying now. Remembering makes me feel bad for kids today.

My husband and I were just married in the early seventies. He was hired by Detroit Diesel as a partsman for the huge earth movers used at the mines. The money was good and we had saved enough money for a down payment on one of the homes there. We couldn’t figure out why our loan wasn’t funded until he and many of the other workers there were laid off. Thank God the banks were aware of the situation and we headed back to LA County to better job offerings. That was over fifty years ago and my husband has since passed. This video brought back some great memories of when we were young and our lives still opening up to what was to become. Thank you!

My Grandfather was a train mechanic there. I stayed with them a lot and went to school there. It was a wonderful place with many interesting people living and working there. You can never go back home.

I lived at Eagle Mountain as a kid from 1967-1971; my Mom was a buyer/purchasing agent for the Mine, and we lived in the house at the corner of Palm and Elm (8:14). Played lawn darts with my brother on that green meridian between Palm and Sage. I still have my class pictures from Kindergarten through 2nd grade before my Mom re-married and we moved to Fontana since my stepdad was the chief optometrist for Kaiser Hospital back in 1971. The Ghost Town is NOT a secret.

I worked at the Eagle Mountain Community Correctional Facility for 7 years as a Parole Agent II. The Department of Corrections oversaw operations of Management Training Corporation (MTC) based in Utah. There were seven CDC personnel stationed there and most lived in the housing facility. One Facility Lieutenant, three CDC Sergeants, and three Parole Agent II's. The facility operations were in the old business area, and the Administration Building was the old Bank of America. The old bank vault was our armory. Inmates lived in the buildings that had been used to house single miners. There were two riots there, the first on Feb 27, 1997 and the most serious injury from that one was a sprained ankle of one of the MTC Correctional Officers. One reason why the first riot didn't get out of control was because at that time, the facility had CDC staff on duty 24/7 and we were able to access the facility armory. We got assistance from two CDC Correctional Officers who were there for transportation purposes and from an off-duty Corrections Officer who worked at Ironwood State Prison and lived in the Eagle Mountain housing and was married to an MTC officer. We were able to get assistance from the California Highway Patrol, US Border Patrol, Bureau of Land Management Rangers, and deputies from the Riverside County Sheriff's Department before back-up assistance arrived from Chuckawalla Valley state prison. I left a couple of years before the second riot which got out of hand, in my opinion, because CDC had stopped 24/7 coverage by Department Law Enforcement personnel and there was no access to the facility armory where they kept shotguns and large pepper spray containers. Also, additional fencing that had been recommended after the first riot was never installed. As a side note, one summer day, Kaiser Resources, who maintained a presence on the facility and their weather station recorded a temperature of 132 degrees - only 2 less that the world record high recorded in Death Valley.

My uncle Jack worked at Kaiser Steel and lived in Eagle Mountain until he retired in 1978.

Can you imagine having to move from this place knowing that no one would buy your house and having to start over in another town broke…

i hauled bentonite to there until the day it closed--the mill used it to make steel--we came out of amagossa,nv and came down the calbaker road,unloaded and went home to vegas and did the same thing day after day--it was a gravy run,great money,my truck--hated to see it close but fontana was a huge smog maker where they rolled the steel

Quite an active place when I worked there temporarily in the late 1960's until a fire department job opened in my town nearby. No mention of the heavy equipment and 100 ton trucks that sped the ore up from the bottom of a mega-huge quarry, the expanse of which would take your breath away when looking down from the top. Thanks for a reminder of an era very much different from today, and proudly a part of my past.

My Godfather was the Cathloic Priest there for many years and my brother Richard grew up there. I remember visiting them and stopping at the Desert Center lake. Good Times.

I live at a shelter on skid row in downtown Los Angeles and I would definitely move here in a heartbeat!!! I have my own tools to help rebuild!!!

Lived here from 1967 to 1980. Fun place to grow up.

That's interesting, never heard of this town. Really adds to this story when people commenting had lived there. Thank you all for sharing your stories.

I grew up here. And, yes, not only would I live here again, but it has been my desire to do so for many, many years!!!

In 1990 I was a truck driver with California fright line. They had the contact to haul away the scrap steel from the mine building’s. Even then it was a ghost town. I was not aware of the prison facility in the town. Learned something new all these years later.

Maybe homeless people can go there and rebuild with their skills and turn it into their own community