A Distant View of the St. Thomas Ghost Town

An unintentionally spooky-looking photo of the Gentry Hotel in St. Thomas, NV. Source: Photo from the Gladys Gentry Collection, Lost City Museum/Lake Mead NRA Public Affairs. CC BY-SA 2.0.

The town of St. Thomas, Nevada, was settled by Mormons in 1865. On August 31, 1869, John Wesley Powell’s First Colorado River Expedition, which culminated in the first recorded passage by raft through the Grand Canyon, came to an end about twenty miles from here. Bishop Leithead of St. Thomas, informed that Powell had, in fact, survived his expedition, rode to meet him. “Bishop Leithhead,” Powell wrote, “brings in his wagon two or three dozen melons, and many other little luxuries, and we are comfortable once more.”

Only two years later, most of the original settlers left due to a dispute over taxes. Other people later moved in and at its peak, the town had over 500 citizens. When Hoover Dam was built in the 1930s, the government bought out the residents. The last person left in 1938 as the town was inundated by the rising waters of the newly-created Lake Mead.

In wetter times, the site lay under 60 feet of water. As lake levels receded with the ongoing drought of the 21st century, the remains of the town have been exposed again.

The view from St. Thomas Point.

To get to St. Thomas, you turn off of Northshore Road and drive 3.5 miles down a rocky dirt road. There’s a parking area, from which you can head down hill to a 2.5 mile hiking trail. We arrived late on a December afternoon and had someplace else to get to before nightfall, so only had time to view the building foundations from a distance.

Foundations of St. Thomas
The foundations of St. Thomas.
The current (decades-long) drought is not the first time St. Thomas has re-emerged from the water. These two cars were abandoned by their owners when Lake Mead’s waters covered the town of St. Thomas in 1938. They were revealed when the lake receded in 1945. Source: Lake Mead NRA Public Affairs. CC BY-SA 2.0.
Jeep Compass Trailhawk
That trusty Jeep Compass again.

Reference:

John Wesley Powell, 1875. Exploration of the Colorado River of the West and its tributaries. Explored in 1869, 1870, 1871, and 1872, under the direction of the secretary of the Smithsonian institution. Government Printing Office, Washington.

First Visit to Hoover Dam

Hoover Dam

My first visit to Hoover Dam, and it’s incredible to see both how big the dam is and how low the water level is behind the dam. In December of 2021, the water elevation of Lake Mead was 1,065 feet above sea level – almost 200 feet lower than its maximum level, and the lowest level since the 1930s, when the lake basin was still being filled.

lake Mead behind Hoover Dam
Low water level at Lake Mead.
The Mike O’Callaghan–Pat Tillman Memorial Bridge, completed in 2010, is the second-highest bridge in the United States. You can walk across it for a great view of Hoover Dam.
The view from the O’Callaghan-Tillman bridge.

A Field Guide to Concrete Screen Blocks

Identify the different styles of breeze block in those mid-century houses in Vegas, Palm Springs, and elsewhere with this Field Guide produced by the Nevada Preservation Foundation and based on the book by Ron and Barbara Marshall.

Excerpt from the Screen Block Field Activity Guide. Source: Nevada Preservation Foundation
Source: Curbed/John Lewis Marshall