Among the more prominent mining ghost towns were Jacob City and Ophir, named after the biblical land of King Solomon's mine. The former's majestic old hotel still stands. Ophir once had mine names like Silveropolis, Wild Delirium and Miner's Delight, along with numerous restaurants, dance halls and brothels. Almost all of that is gone today, although a handful of people still live there. Nearby was Mercur, a booming 19th century gold and silver mining town which once had a population of 12,000 with a generous number of brothels and saloons.
Old photographs show a teeming town dominated by a huge mill and tailings mound on a hill.
Today, there is virtually nothing but the mill's foundation on a hillside. The transplants were Mormon converts who traded their island paradise in the 1880s for sunbaked Tooele County to participate in Mormon temple ceremonies. In just a matter of hours, the thriving mining town of Mercur, Utah, became a ghost town. The top photo shows the town on July 24, 1902. The bottom photo is what was left just 2.5 hours after a fire destroyed it on July 26, two days later.