Picher is a ghost town and former city in Ottawa County, northeastern Oklahoma, United States. It was a major national center of lead and zinc mining for more than 100 years in the heart of the Tri-State Mining District. On September 1, 2009, the state of Oklahoma officially dis-incorporated the city of Picher, which ceased official operations on that day.[1] The last mines were closed in 1970s, leaving the population to decline.
Coverage[]
Picher is featured in Toxic Revenge, where 40 years after people have left the wind to blow freely through the abandoned streets of a Middle American town that had been afflicted by a total of three forms of 'toxic revenge' all caused by the very thing that built the town, mining. Bob Nairn and Earl Hatley tour the town and explain the history of the town and the effects the contaminants had on the town and its people.
History[]
The thriving town of Pitcher, before its abandonment.
Picher, Oklahoma was once at the center of the largest lead and zinc deposit in the world, and today, all that remains is an empty town filled with poison that can't be removed from a land that can't be fixed. As the world plunged into 2 world wars, tanks, guns, and ammunition created a huge appetite for lead, leading mining towns like Pitcher to spring up. However, when the wars ended and in the 1950's and 60's, the mines shut down one by one until the last one closed in 1970. Bob Nairn stated that Pitcher was a commodity town and, like in other industrial towns, once the need for a commodity town's product goes away, the population decreases. As many as 30,000 citizens filled Picher at it's height, but today it stands almost entirely derelict, with only a few dozen stubborn souls remaining in the town. Bob Nairn stated that Picher was a lot like most small towns in the middle part of America with hardworking folks and mining history with the salt of the Earth folks that raised their families and made do.
Exploration[]
Chat, the First Sign[]
Chat, the first nail in the coffin.
While the mines closing down drove some residents away, it was what the mines left behind that spelled the beginning of the end for Pitcher. Hills of gravel known as chat piles, were the first sign of the town's degradation. Bob Nairn stated that a chat pile is a large pile of gravel-like material that was left behind after the minerals were processed. He continues, saying that the material that could be recovered was taken and put in chat piles, which were effectively waste heaps that people had little use for. At this point, these piles have sat on the surface for the better part of a century. Chat piles contain toxic doses of lead, zinc, and other metals, and the gusty winds blowing over the plains of the midwestern United States frequently scatters dust off the some 75 million tons of chat.
One of the victims of the effects of chat piles was a Little League baseball field, which was used for years even when citizens moved away or fled from Picher. Bob Nairn stated that kids came out to play and everybody was using it like a kind of playground and hangout area, with picnic tables even being present. After a dozen years without people, a tree now grows where the pitcher's mound once stoood and native prairie grass, once displaced for decades, is returning. Earl Hatley stated that the seeds for the old prairie are still in the dirt and didn't go away, and while one may burn it and till it, the seeds will always be there and, with the right conditions, will begin to grow again.
Sinkholes, the Second Sign[]
A sinkhole, another nail in the coffin and a more obvious warning sign.
Picher's main street, South Connell Avenue, has been abandoned for more than 30 years, but it wasn't closed by the toxic dust wafting from chat piles. Instead, it was because of the formation of sinkholes that had been created by the removal of all the rock. Earl Hatley stated that the main street was shut down because of a collapse and the ground gave in over the left side of the street. In the process of digging an estimated 300 miles of tunnels, miners had removed so much of the rock and soil beneath the main street that sinkholes started forming and destroying parts of Picher as they formed. Bob Nairn stated that some of the underground workings were 100 feet from floor to ceiling while Earl Hatley stated that the miners mined too close to the surface in a lot of areas, with some of them mining all the way up to the tree roots and the area could cave in at any moment. Today, grass grown in the cracks in the pavement where miners and their families once looked for supplies, and where shopkeepers once welcomed patrols have saplings stand guard. Earl Hatley stated that there was a Sears, JC Penny, a trading post, and hardware store where one came to get what needed, even if it was a drink, shirt, or new pair of shoes, it has much all of it and one didn't have to go anywhere else. It's all still on display like a pair of shoes, magazines, and supplies with antiquated cash registers still standby waiting for customers that will never show.
Groundwater Contamination, the Third Sign[]
Poisoned groundwater, the final and deadliest nail in Pitcher's coffin.
It wasn't until a decade after the last mines closed that the underground caverns opened up by mining began to affect Pitcher in ways other than sinkholes. Poisoned groundwater, caused by miners breaching a natural groundwater reservoir to reach more underground lead and zinc deposits. Bab Nairn stated that during mining operations, miners pumped about 55 million gallons of water out of the mines every single day, and once the mining stopped, they shut the pumps off and the natural groundwater began to flood the mines. Earl Hatley stated that the water was coming out of the mineshafts because the miners had breached the aquifer. By some estimates, there's enough polluted water below ground to fill over a million residential swimming pools. Bob Nairn stated that humans are hard pressed to find another activity that causes as much damage as mining can and humans open up the Earth, remove what they want, and leave it when it is finished. It happened in Picher, and the town now stands empty because of it.
Exploration Conclusion[]
The exploration concluded that the mines were the town's foundation, but toxic water, chat piles and sinkholes tore it down. Earl Hatley stated that the lead used to bomb Germany and Japan is what destroyed Picher, and today there is no hope of safely living in the town.
Gallery[]
