Abandoned town near Springfield?

[Sertile]

Would this be Spencer, Missouri?

God damn Spencer... ghost town my ass. Biggest disappointment of my life, that's what Spencer was. See those three stores right there? That's all there is, and they're just sitting in someone's front yard. I went to school in Morrisville, and it was ten times the ghost town Spencer was.

[gunc0r3]

they lived in the camp? whoa, trip. or was it the old house back... behind it, i guess (if the entrance was from national.) that place was crazy weird.

do you know any other history of the property? like, a boy/girl scout camp? family thing? the presence of the mainframe totally tripped me out... i mean, it was sitting there like it had been set up, not just dumped off or anything.

//j

[Willard]

I don't talk to the ex anymore, but I can go to the Library Center and do some research.

[DblD]

I’ll chime in on this…
New to the site. Very interesting stuff here.

I visited this camp often while building an old off-road truck. I owned a shop on Republic road and would take the old truck out to this location to test the 4 wheel drive system. That would have been in the mid to late 90’s. Approaching the camp from Kissick Avenue – north of the dam bridge - there was a long steep climb on loose ground. Once on top of the bluff, it was easy to drive around and explore. I didn’t see any computer ruins but do remember the pool and several buildings with crumbling walls. I can remember having a very uneasy feeling about being at this location. Nothing specific, I can put my finger on but just a strange feeling. There was a lot of graffiti with pentagrams and occult type of messages. Looked like a barn with perhaps horse stables there also. I didn’t see any signs of auto dismantling either.

I was back out on the same spot last weekend looking at a new house. As I can tell, all signs of the old camp are long gone in favor of new high-dollar homes built one right on top of another – Damn Progress and Urban Sprawl.

I hope to come back to the site often and add any info I can - when appropriate. For what it’s worth, I was born and raised in Springfield and have 30 plus years of fuzzy memories floating around my head. I’ll see if there are any that interest you all.

dd

[Willard]

I hope to come back to the site often and add any info I can - when appropriate. For what it’s worth, I was born and raised in Springfield and have 30 plus years of fuzzy memories floating around my head. I’ll see if there are any that interest you all.

"Fuzzy Memories" by DblD

[David Keetz]

...fuzzy memories

..........fuzzy math....


....
...

[81k]

have you learned anything more about the abandoned town with the cars and everything? that sounds amazing?

[Willard]

What I originally posted for this thread is all I know

[TR146x]

I know what you're talking about. It's an old campsite and the entrance used to be off of National near the old golf course way south of Weaver (that's the cross street at National that T's with Fremont). Anyway the camp was named Sheltering Heights Camp. Here's the topo view of it
Sheltering Heights Topo View
An interesting thing however, I'm told there are ruins of an old hunting lodge just to the east of Kissick Road (the road that crosses the dam) Just before you go across the dam. I'm told it's in the valley somewhere to the east of the road. It's on my 1904 plat map of Clay Township, but I looked for it today but didn't find anything, however there was a ton of poison ivy growing all over the place and as I'm highly alergic, I was risking a lot just going where I did.

This is driving me nuts Willard. I know the area of which you speak very wll. I know the camp. I’m now thinking, however, of another spot, presumably the lodge you mention. Picture yourself going down Kissick in the fall. Before you cross the dam, if you turn and look east West, you will see a largish structure, presumably a house, through the leafless trees. You can also see the gates to the drive.

What is this? The driveway looks very much like the one that went to the old Weaver Estate that sits off Farm Road 157 (Old Campbell Road) nearly identical in fact.

Ideas?

[Willard]

If these are the same gates I'm thinking of that are before Kissick starts to curve, I know of the gates... thing is I don't know anything about the property behind them. sorry

[slow_walker]

God damn Spencer... ghost town my ass. Biggest disappointment of my life, that's what Spencer was. See those three stores right there? That's all there is, and they're just sitting in someone's front yard. I went to school in Morrisville, and it was ten times the ghost town Spencer was.

Okay, I did a search and discovered you guys have discussed this place before. So, now I can see it's not that exciting. Plus, I learned a valuable lesson - start doing searches before going crazy with new topics.

My bad!

[RV driver]

I know what you're talking about. It's an old campsite and the entrance used to be off of National near the old golf course way south of Weaver (that's the cross street at National that T's with Fremont). Anyway the camp was named Sheltering Heights Camp. Here's the topo view of it
Sheltering Heights Topo View
The map was made July 1st 1975. The airial photo should still have the camp on it concidering the photos haven't been updated since 1996.

I first found out about the campsite a couple of years ago when I was dateing a girl that lived on the site after it was abandoned. Her family was leasing it from the owner and her dad used to have her and her siblings tear down cars there.

An interesting thing however, I'm told there are ruins of an old hunting lodge just to the east of Kissick Road (the road that crosses the dam) Just before you go across the dam. I'm told it's in the valley somewhere to the east of the road. It's on my 1904 plat map of Clay Township, but I looked for it today but didn't find anything, however there was a ton of poison ivy growing all over the place and as I'm highly alergic, I was risking a lot just going where I did.

This old "hunting lodge" is probably part of the original Sheltering Heights camp. They moved it when they flooded the lake. I have another thread somewhere on here about the history of the camp. It was a church camp begun by a radio minister, and was originally located down by the river I think in the '40s.

[BagHead727]

Does your hand have a seizure every time you click the "Submit" button?

[RV driver]

Does your hand have a seizure every time you click the "Submit" button?

i
I can't figure out why it's doing that!

[Nicotti]

Holy Thread Resurrection Batman!