Ghost Town – MishMoments

Bodie – California Ghost Town – Wheaton and Hollis Hotel – Milky Way

June 21, 2019June 21, 2019Posted in BodieTagged Bodie, California, Eastern Sierra, Ghost Town, Milky Way, Wheaton and Hollis Hotel2 Comments

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 11mm, F16, ISO 6400 for 47 seconds.

The Milky Way is indeed visible from this location at the front of the Wheaton and Hollis Hotel. Once again you need an extreme wide angle lens to get the shot.

The second image is cropped, standing further back. I was also standing further to the right.

In September, the Milky Way is nearly vertical. In early Spring, the Milky Way forms a low arch and in July it is on a strong diagonal.

Additional Bodie Images

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

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Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

This wraps up my Bode set except for a video slideshow of my best stills in these articles.

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Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Standard Stamp Gold Mill

June 15, 2019Posted in BodieTagged Bodie, California, Eastern Sierra, Fulton Iron Works, Ghost Town, Gold Mine, Stamp MillLeave a comment

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 18mm, F16, ISO 500 for 2.5 seconds.

Lighting in the mill is difficult. Windows and lights blow out highlights. Shadows easily go black. The shots inside the mine are High Dynamic Range (HDR) blends.

Lightroom usually does a poor job at this but it did handle the feature image, which I further modified. Here are a couple more images from the inside of the mill.

That’s what a gold processing mill looked like in the 1920’s.

Additional Bodie Images

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

I have two more Bodie sets coming up. Then it will be time to move on to another detailed look at someplace else.

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Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Morgue, Schoolhouse, James Stuart Cain Residence, Jailhouse

June 6, 2019Posted in BodieTagged Bodie, Cain Residence, California, Eastern Sierra, Ghost Town, Jailhouse, Morgue, Schoolhouse1 Comment

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 11mm, F16, ISO 250 for 1 second.

The Morgue was one of my favorite buildings. I like the pastel colors on the coffins. This shot absolutely requires an extreme wide angle lens. It was not possible to stand back. My back was to the wall.

The morgue is so narrow that only one person was allowed in the building at a time. We were given two minutes.

Second Morgue Image

James Stewart Cain Residence

Canon TS-E 17mm f/4L Tilt-Shift Lens ISO 640 F16. This shot was extremely backlit so this is a blend of multiple exposures.

We did not have inside access to this building, unfortunately. The bottle collection visible through the front window looks interesting.

Jailhouse Images

Schoolhouse

I used my Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens for both images.

The contrast on the first schoolhouse image was extreme given the windows. These are multiple exposure blends.

Additional Bodie Images

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

I have a few more Bodie sets coming up. Then it will be time to move on to another detailed look at someplace else.

Please Subscribe and Follow.

Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Johl House

May 30, 2019May 31, 2019Posted in BodieTagged Bodie, California, Eastern Sierra, Ghost Town, Johl House4 Comments

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 24mm, F16, ISO 500 for 1/5 second.

The Johl House provides a well-preserved example of life in the 1920s in an upscale mining town.

Johl House Living Room

Johl House Dining Room Entrance

Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 14mm, F16, ISO 500 for 0.8 seconds.

Johl House Dining Room

Canon TS-E 17mm f/4L Tilt-Shift Lens ISO 200 F16 for 6 seconds.

Johl House Kitchen

Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 14mm, F16, ISO 500 for 1.0 second.

Additional Bodie Images

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.

There is much more coming up. Please Subscribe and Follow.

Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Barbershop, Boarding House, Firehouse

May 23, 2019May 30, 2019Posted in UncategorizedTagged Barber Shop, Bodie, California, Eastern Sierra, Firehouse, Ghost Town, Milky Way, Western Washer2 Comments

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 20mm, F4.5, ISO 6400 for 61 seconds. Stars will streak beyond about 20 seconds so I shot them separately with a star tracker then merged the images.

The formula for determining when stars will stop looking like points if governed by the formula e = 400/FL.

E is the exposure time in seconds. 400 is a constant from experience and FL is the focal length of the lens in mm.

The result of this image would be 20 seconds. My exposure was 60 seconds.

Barbershop Interior

Boarding House

We did not have access to that building. I took the above shots through a window.

They were taken with a Canon 16-35MM F4 L Lens at 16mm and 19mm continuing the streak of very wide angle images.

Firehouse

Additional Bodie Images

The first two articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.

There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.

Please Subscribe and Follow.

Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Sam Leon Saloon

May 15, 2019May 15, 2019Posted in BodieTagged 1927 Dodge Graham, Ace of Spades, Bodie, California, Eastern Sierra, Ghost Town, poker, Roulette, Sam Leon SaloonLeave a comment

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep but worth it. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 19mm, F16, ISO 500 for 1.3 seconds. The saloon is fascinating. Here are some additional images.

Additional Bodie Images – Wide Angle and Tilt-Shift Discussion

The first two articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.

Wide angle lenses were used again in this set. The first 4 images in this set were between focal lengths of 11mm and 19mm.

The roulette wheel was taken at 80mm and the poker table at 24mm.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.

There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.

Please Subscribe and Follow.

Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

Bodie Ghost Town – Boone Store Shell Station and 1927 Dodge Graham Pickup Truck

May 8, 2019May 8, 2019Posted in BodieTagged 1927 Dodge Graham, Bodie, Boone Store, California, Eastern Sierra, Ghost Town, Old Cars, Shell Gas Station, Sunset, Truck2 Comments

The Bodie State Historic Park is a genuine California gold-mining ghost town.

Visitors can walk down the deserted streets of a town that once had a population of nearly 10,000 people. The town is named for Waterman S. Body (William Bodey), who had discovered small amounts of gold in hills north of Mono Lake. In 1875, a mine cave-in revealed pay dirt, which led to purchase of the mine by the Standard Company in 1877. People flocked to Bodie and transformed it from a town of a few dozen to a boomtown.

Only a small part of the town survives, preserved in a state of “arrested decay.” Interiors remain as they were left and stocked with goods. Designated as a National Historic Site and a State Historic Park in 1962, the remains of Bodie are being preserved in a state of “arrested decay”. Today this once thriving mining camp is visited by tourists, howling winds and an occasional ghost.

Access

Winter hours 9am to 4pm (November 4th to April 15th)
Summer hours 9am-6pm (April 15th to November 3rd )

In the winter, you may need a snowmobile to get in. The road is not plowed.

The only access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building is by permit. The cost is steep. My wife Liz and I went on a photography tour at $800 a pop.

The tour gave us access at sunrise, sunset, and the interiors of the building at mid-day.

Feature Image Details

I used a Canon 11-24 F4.0 L lens at 17mm, F16, ISO 250.

The light at sunset does not match the light on the 927 Dodge Graham Pickup Truck. This is a blend of two or more exposures.

Here is an image facing the opposite direction.

That’s what a Shell Gas Station looked like in the late 1920s.

Additional Bodie Images – Wide Angle and Tilt-Shift Discussion

Those articles discuss the importance of very wide angle lenses and tilt-shift lenses for photographing Bodie and the interiors of buildings in general.

Eastern Sierra Area

Equipment List

Those interested in my equipment and recommendations can find it here: Mish’s Equipment List.

Please Subscribe: Click to Subscribe by Email.

If you like this article, please share by email or use one of the share buttons beneath the article.

You can also follow me on Twitter! I have both an economic forum and a photography forum.

Photography: MishMoments
Economics: MishGEA

MishMoments is a subset of MishGEA. Those interested in photography only should follow MishMoments.

This is just the beginning of my Bodie series.

There is much more coming up: Sam Leon’s saloon, the morgue, the Methodist church, a Shell gas station, the schoolhouse, the barbershop, other buildings, and milky way shots at night.

Please Subscribe and Follow.

Thanks!

Mike “Mish” Shedlock

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