It was a beautiful Arizona morning in Tombstone (below) when I decided to inquire about ghost towns in southern Arizona. Fortunately, there was a very friendly woman working the desk of the Tombstone Visitor Center, and she seemed almost happy when I told her I was interested in ghost towns in the area. A sort of smile broke on her face as she pulled a three ring binder from beneath the counter. She scrolled to the back and pull out one of her last photocopied pages containing direction and a brief description of Gleeson, Arizona.
When she handed me the over produced photocopy, she asked what kind of car I was driving. I told her it was a four-door KIA. She paused for a moment, and then I told her it was a rental. Then she claimed "well then, there is nothing to worry about now is there." Then she told me to make sure I had enough water.
Gleeson, Arizona is a very remote town located about 30 miles northwest of Tombstone, It can be found on a remote stretch of road, now known as the Ghost Town Trail. The Ghost Town Trail spans the Desert of Cochise County and threads through the deserted towns of Gleeson, Courtland, and Pearce. Most of the trail is unimproved dirt road navigating through desert wildlife, roaming cattle, and beautiful views of the Dragoon Mountains off in the distance.
The area around Gleeson had a long history of mining. Indians, most likely Apache, who resided in southern Arizona, mined turquoise in the Dragoon Mountains up until white mining pioneers arrived in the 1870s. The first pioneer encampment was named Turquoise and it's post office was established 1890. The Turquoise mine operated until 1894, when a miner by the name of Jimmy Pearce, who discovered gold, opened his Commonwealth Mine in 1894, just down the road from Turquoise. John Gleeson worked for a brief period in the mining town of Pearce, but then settled on the eastern tip of the Dragoon Mountains in an area once known as Turquoise.
John Gleeson was born in Ireland in 1861, possibly around Tipperary. He immigrated to Mount Pleasant, Iowa in 1879 at the age of 18. Shortly after settling in Iowa, he moved west to Breckenridge, Colorado where he worked gold mines in the area. After working in Colorado for brief time, he moved to Tombstone. From Tombstone, John Gleeson migrated within the region of Arizona and New Mexico from mining town to mining town. In 1897, John Gleeson laid claim to the Copper Bell Mine and assisted in the foundation of the town that bore his name.
Resources...
Wikipedia.com: "Gleeson Arizona"
Ghosttowns.com: "Gleeson, Arizona"
USGenWeb Project: John Gleeson Biography
Genealogy.com: "Gleeson, Arizona, John & Elizabeth 1890s"
Rozylowicz.com: "Gleeson - A Turquoise Mining Town"
eggbod
I lived in what was once called South West Africa - now Namibia in a diamond mining town called Oranjemund.
Up along the coast was a couple of ghost towns. Pomona was one........looking very similar to your top photograph.