The last 150 years have seen several oil booms and busts which have risen all over the world. Thanks to oil production going dry or surplus in liquid gold, people are no longer needed to drill oil. Worse, automation in the industry has given reduction in the jobs. It is not surprising to see that oil production has lead to several people entering new towns, but leaving them once production went dry.
As you know the price of crude oil is very less than what it used to be few years ago, which has resulted in many towns going out and becoming ghost towns.
Some of the towns include:
- Pithole City, Pennsylvania
- Mentryville, California
- Burbank, Oklahoma
- Williston, North Dakota
Pithole City, Pennsylvania
Pithole City in Pennsylvania is perhaps the ideal town which resembles the ghost town due to people leaving in large numbers. As early as 1865, the town saw a population of close to 20,000 which then became lesser than 200 by 1870. Fewer technologies were required to drill out petroleum and the demand for that soon ran dry.
Mentryville, California
With the mention of oil production and leaving, California tops the states. It is home to many towns which have been troubled due to stoppage of drillings. Mentryville is one such town and faces a completely abandoned. The only highlight about this town is that you will find it being put to good use in several blockbuster serials like the X-files and movies like the A-Team and Murder, She Wrote.
BBC News even recently reported that several local businesses are struggling due to the unpredicted recent dip in crude prices.
Burbank, Oklahoma
Oklahoma is known as the state of resources and education. Nobody really expected it to appear on this list. Burbank in Oklahoma was another place which became a ghost town as a result of closure of oil production. As early as 1920s the town saw close to 3,000 people and within 1930 it became to 372.
Oil is known as liquid gold for no reason. The above cities or places which where booming industries are now similar to a dessert, which just goes to show that when oil production and use is not carefully planned, then there can be severe consequences. One of them is the mass reduction of people leaving the place and making it like a ghost town.
