Weird history40.5963° N, 122.4950° W
Shasta, CA
Brick ruins, a preserved courthouse and traces of a Gold Rush business district survive in what was once the major mining-era town of Shasta.
- Access
- Open to visitors
Weird history
Everything OddWay knows about. Narrow it down by what you're after, or where you're going.
Weird history2,650
Suggest a stopReal events too strange to have made the textbook.
- Weird history39.0331° N, 94.6247° W
Fairway, KS
Three surviving buildings interpret the mission school where Shawnee, Delaware, and other Native children were educated under 19th-century federal assimilation policies. The site is historically important precisely because the story includes forced cultural change as well as local settlement history.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history30.4050° N, 88.8206° W
Ocean Springs, MS
A family pottery compound founded by Peter Anderson in 1928 and still producing ceramics using long-established forms, glazes and local traditions. The showroom is public while the working property remains an active craft site, so visitors should follow posted access rules.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history44.3955° N, 73.2471° W
Shelburne, VT
This enormous former Vanderbilt-Webb country estate was laid out with landscape work by Frederick Law Olmsted and includes monumental barns, an inn and more than a thousand acres along Lake Champlain. The scale and theatrical design make the property feel closer to a self-contained Gilded Age world than an ordinary Vermont farm.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history57.0505° N, 135.3222° W
Sitka, AK
One of Alaska's oldest museums holds Native material culture collected across the state, including masks, carvings, clothing and tools from many distinct peoples. The collection is historically important but should also be read critically because much of it was assembled during a colonial missionary period.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history29.2057° N, 83.0644° W
Cedar Key, FL
Massive ancient shell-mound complex in Lower Suwannee National Wildlife Refuge.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history36.6875° N, 108.8368° W
Shiprock, NM
The volcanic neck known as Shiprock rises dramatically from Navajo Nation land and holds deep cultural significance to Diné people. Climbing and unauthorized approach are inappropriate; OddWay should route only to lawful public-road viewpoints and respect all tribal restrictions.
- Access
- Roadside, no entry
- Weird history33.9094° N, 78.0829° W
Oak Island, NC
The skeletal remains of the 138-foot cargo ship Mary E. Morris sit in a landscaped median in an Oak Island neighborhood. The vessel sank in 1893, spent roughly a century underwater, and was eventually moved onto land, creating the surreal sight of a shipwreck sitting in the middle of a street.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history36.8838° N, 80.8529° W
Max Meadows, VA
This roughly 75-foot stone tower was built in the early 1800s to manufacture lead shot by dropping molten lead from the top so it formed into spheres while falling. The grounds are accessible as part of Virginia's state park system, while entry into the tower itself is restricted to scheduled openings and programs.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history33.9986° N, 95.5038° W
Hugo, OK
A section of Mount Olivet Cemetery holds circus performers and workers beneath headstones decorated with elephants, tents and show-business imagery. The unusual memorials reflect Hugo's long association with traveling circuses; visit respectfully.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history32.5081° N, 93.7532° W
Shreveport, LA
This Art Deco auditorium is a cornerstone of Louisiana Hayride history and helped launch performers including Elvis Presley. It remains an active event venue, so interior access depends on tours, shows and the building calendar.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history42.6360° N, 72.9058° W
Charlemont, MA
A Mohawk Trail rest area marks the place where travelers historically forded the Deerfield River to avoid paying a turnpike toll. The act helped popularize the term 'shunpike' for deliberately bypassing toll roads.
- Access
- Roadside, no entry
- Weird history40.0485° N, 78.1291° W
Fulton County, PA
Sideling Hill Tunnel is a 6,782-foot former Pennsylvania Turnpike tunnel abandoned when the highway was rerouted in 1968. It is now part of the informal Pike2Bike route; reaching it requires hiking or cycling, and the interior is completely unlit, wet and rough, so visitors need lights and should use the established access points.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history42.3433° N, 72.1428° W
New Braintree, MA
Several lonely roadside stones mark locations connected with the 1675 Siege of Brookfield during King Philip's War, including an ambush and a camp associated with Metacomet. The markers preserve a violent chapter of colonial and Indigenous history that is otherwise easy to drive past.
- Access
- Roadside, no entry
- Weird history47.4716° N, 115.9257° W
Wallace, ID
A guided underground mining experience reached from downtown Wallace, with retired miners interpreting drilling, blasting and Silver Valley mining work. Tours are seasonal and ticketed.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history48.5366° N, 121.7581° W
Concrete, WA
Massive former cement silos were repainted with a giant 'WELCOME TO CONCRETE' message and preserved as the defining landmark of town. The surrounding public park provides the lawful viewing point.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history35.5977° N, 118.4916° W
Bodfish, CA
More than twenty historic structures rescued from abandoned Kern Valley mining camps since the 1970s. The Corlew family bought the property in 1988, restored it and reopened in 1992. Now a small museum and film location with posted daily hours that depend on the weather.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history43.0165° N, 116.7326° W
Silver City, ID
Remote nineteenth-century mining town with an unusually large collection of surviving historic buildings and a small modern seasonal population. Roads can be rough and snowbound; respect private homes and enter only businesses or buildings explicitly open to visitors.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history37.2537° N, 113.3672° W
Leeds, UT
Silver Reef was a rare mining town built around silver extracted from sandstone. The restored Wells Fargo building and surrounding ruins now form a museum complex focused on the boomtown's unusual geology and history.
- Access
- Seasonal or ticketed
- Weird history29.2163° N, 82.0559° W
Silver Springs, FL
Historic glass-bottom boats, submerged archaeology, film history, and famous rhesus monkeys nearby.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history39.3147° N, 119.6401° W
Virginia City, NV
A sprawling complex of fraternal, ethnic, religious, and civic cemeteries climbs the hillside above Virginia City, preserving the diversity of the Comstock population.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history42.0373° N, 71.0793° W
Easton, MA
An independent bottling plant operating over a natural spring since the nineteenth century still produces old-fashioned sodas and lets visitors fill water jugs from the source. The property preserves vintage equipment and a stubbornly old-school soda-making tradition.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history42.4711° N, 96.3925° W
South Sioux City, NE
This riverfront memorial complex includes military monuments, large artifacts and a replica Vietnam Veterans Memorial wall. Its concentration of military remembrance and machinery makes it a substantial public stop along Nebraska’s northeastern edge.
- Access
- Open to visitors
- Weird history42.3637° N, 71.0537° W
Boston, MA
A small display at the Paul Revere House recalls the first bell cast in Boston by Paul Revere. Contemporary criticism suggested his earliest effort sounded rather bad, giving the celebrated craftsman a refreshingly imperfect first attempt.
- Access
- Open to visitors