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Custer Ghost Town Travel Guide


Custer Ghost Town Attractions & Activities - The Best Holiday Destinations for 2020

Custer is in Central Idaho. Custer, was founded in early 1879 by speculators who laid the town out right below the General Custer mill site. During the 1880's it was second in importance to nearby Bonanza, reaching a peak population of only 300. In the 1890's however, Custer superseded Bonanza as the most important town of the Yankee Fork. Economically supported by the operations of the Lucky Boy and Black mines, Custer reached its peak population of 600 in 1896.

Custer Schoolhouse
Custer Schoolhouse

Custer was a one street town. The town extended for half a mile from the Centaurs Dairy and the General Custer mill at the upper end, to the Nevada Hotel and the Miners Union Hall at the lower end. Chinatown, with about thirty residents, was situated right below the lower end of Custer.

Nearby Bonanza was a sister city and the business and social center until fires in 1889 and 1897 destroyed much of the town. Many merchants re-established their businesses in Custer, gradually making it the new business and social center for Yankee Fork area. Custer sported a new school house, jail, Miner's Union Hall, post office, and baseball team.

By 1903, the glory days of mining were slipping away as the mines played out one by one. Business slumped and by 1910 Custer had become a ghost town. The Challis National Forest took ownership of the area in 1966, and in 1981, Custer was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. Through the efforts of the Friends of Custer Museum, the site was kept open for public enjoyment. In 1990, the Idaho Department of Parks and Recreation joined the Forest Service in managing Custer. This led to the establishment of the Land of the Yankee Fork Historic Area.


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Custer Ghost Town Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.

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