Trojan, also known as Portland, is a

ghost town Ghost Town(s) or Ghosttown may refer to: * Ghost town, a town that has been abandoned Film and television * ''Ghost Town'' (1936 film), an American Western film by Harry L. Fraser * ''Ghost Town'' (1956 film), an American Western film by All ...

in the

Black Hills The Black Hills ( lkt, Ȟe Sápa; chy, Moʼȯhta-voʼhonáaeva; hid, awaxaawi shiibisha) is an isolated mountain range rising from the Great Plains of North America in western South Dakota and extending into Wyoming, United States. Black ...

of Lawrence County,

South Dakota South Dakota (; Sioux: , ) is a U.S. state in the North Central region of the United States. It is also part of the Great Plains. South Dakota is named after the Lakota and Dakota Sioux Native American tribes, who comprise a large porti ...

. It was established by and named after the Trojan Mining Company.

Naming

Trojan got its name from its founding company, the Trojan Mining Company. Its earlier name, Portland, came from the nearby Portland Mine.

History

As early as 1877,

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile me ...

was known to be inside Bald Mountain and Green Mountain, located in the Trojan area. By 1900, many claims had been sorted out into only a few, and by 1911, the Trojan Mining Company held the majority of them. In 1928, the Trojan Mining Company was bought out by the Bald Mountain Mining Company. However, by the 1950s, the ore in the Trojan mines was only being sold for $6 per ton, which did not provide enough of a profit to keep the mines in operation. Steel and powder, which were required to run the mines, increased in price, but gold remained $35 an ounce, which it had been since 1934. In 1959, all operations shut down and every mining building, including the miners' homes, closed. In 1960, the mine's rails were removed. For a time, the town tried to revive itself by providing for skiers at Terry Peak, but they were not successful. In 1983, the open pit Wharf Mine was established in the Trojan area and continues in operation to this day. It has grown to the extent to have completely enveloped the old townsite and Bald Mountain Mill so that there are no historic remains at those sites.

Geography

Trojan is located in the

of central Lawrence County,

, United States."GNIS Detail - Trojan."
USGS. U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey., 13 Feb. 1980. Geographic Names Information System (GNIS). Web. 24 Aug. 2013.

References

{{authority control Ghost towns in South Dakota Mining communities in South Dakota