Idaho Has It’s Own Atlantis, Explore the Underwater Ghost Town

Idaho has some legendary ghost towns around the state. One of the most intriguing ghost towns in the gem state is now fully underwater. According to only in your state, Roosevelt in Valley County was booming in the 1890s, with a population over 7,000 at its prime. There was tons of national hype about the area, specifically Thunder Mountain being the biggest gold producer in the US, so thousands came from all over to get their hands on some gold. Roosevelt and a nearby town Monumental Creek grew quickly.

It seemed like nothing could disrupt this booming gold mining town, until.... Mother nature had other plans for the town. Years of hydraulic mining caused weak land nearby and an unusually rainy spring started to cause landslides. What started off as some smallish landslides here and there suddenly turned into disaster.

Within two short days major mudslides and massive landslides took over the area and the town. Residents had to flee in a hurry and within a few more days the entire town of Roosevelt was completely submerged. Now what used to be the town of Roosevelt is now Roosevelt Lake.

When the light is just right and the water is calm you can even see the building structures under the surface of the water. Random items from residents have floated up here and there over the last 100+ years but at this point not much is left of our little Atlantis.

There are some interesting old pictures of the town before the flooding that you can see here at Western Mining History website.

If you ever want to check it out for yourself it is a bit hard to find. Most maps have the lake unnamed and it is in a very remote location. The lake and its underwater town sits next to what is now five different national forests: the Boise, Salmon-Challis, Payette, Bitterroot, and Nex Perce-Clearwater.