After making a map for a Ghost Town Road Trip through South Alabama, several readers requested a guide to ghost towns in north Alabama so I went on a trip and visited six of them. Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Click here to see the map for the South Alabama Ghost Town Road Trip.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

I wrote about the towns I visited in northeast Alabama individually – their histories are linked below – then created this map. Note: Many of the buildings that remain in ghost towns are on private property where trespassing is illegal.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

1. Bellefonte, Jackson County

Today, only three things remain of the town of Bellefonte: A cemetery filled with its early residents, the vine-covered chimney of an old inn and its name. In 1828, it was a bustling town in Jackson County built about a mile from the Tennessee River for easy access for transporting goods to market. The chimney to one of the town's inns is shown here. Click here for a story and more photos, as well as a map.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

A courthouse and jail were built to serve Jackson County in Bellefonte, located off U.S. Highway 72 where the unfinished Bellefonte Nuclear Plant now stands. The Tennessee Valley Authority began building the plant in 1976 but it was never operational. It was recently purchased. Click here for details about the project.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Bellefonte was incorporated in 1821 and a post office was built sometime after 1822. It was located on the stage line from Knoxville to Huntsville. The courthouse was burned during the Civil War and, after the Memphis to Charleston Railroad was built in Scottsboro, people gradually left the town of Bellefonte.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

The historic Bellefonte Cemetery is located on a hill near the surviving chimney.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

2. Battelle, DeKalb County

Battelle was a busy mining town nestled in a valley of the Lookout Mountains in DeKalb County. The ruins of two buildings and several coke ovens, barely visible beneath drapes of vines and trees, are all that remain today. The site is remote and difficult to reach. Click here for a story and more photos, as well as a map. The historic marker for the town is in Valley Head, Ala., 5 miles from the site due to Battelle's remote location.

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(Landmarks of DeKalb)

Lookout Mountain Iron Co. built a blast furnace with an 85-foot stack and four stoves, a boiler plant and a power house at Battelle. The town grew around it and grew to include 200 tenement houses "of two, three and four rooms," "two hotels for whites and one for Negroes," a two-story school, a church, a large store, stables, a supply house, company office and more, according to a description in a 1906 issue of Iron Age magazine. This photo shows the furnace of the Lookout Mountain Iron Company in 1904.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

The buildings were so dilapidated it was difficult to determine their original purpose. Between them were the remains of beehive coke ovens, which were used to heat charcoal into a cleaner-burning coal coke used to fuel the furnace.

Click here for photos of preserved beehive coke ovens in West Blocton, AL.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Frame of the second building at Battelle.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

The town that investors thought would rival Birmingham would be abandoned after the ore played out. The furnace itself was dismantled and moved to Calcutta, India, where it operated until 15 years ago, according to DiscoverLookoutMountain.com. This photo shows ruins of coke ovens at the site.

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(Source: Down Home in Cherokee County)

3. Bluffton, Cherokee County

Bluffton, a mining community in Cherokee County, was perhaps best known for its spectacular Signal Hotel set high on a bluff. Reportedly, Rudyard Kipling once stayed at the inn, which was built in 1889 so guests could take advantage of the natural lithium springs that fed Hurricane Creek. Today, nothing remains at Bluffton but a church and cemetery. Following Reconstruction, geologists from Woodard Iron Co. of Birmingham and Tecumseh Iron Co. "discovered rich, iron, zinc and other mineral deposits," according to a story in The Anniston Star.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Bluffton was founded in 1888 and by 1890 was the largest town in Cherokee County, with 8,000 residents. The Bluffton Land, Ore and Furnace Co. operated an iron mine and built the luxurious bluff-top hotel. At its height, Bluffton had a school, numerous businesses and Cherokee County's first electrical generating plant. Its post office operated there from 1888 to 1934.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

This photo shows the view from atop the bluff today.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Salem Baptist Church at Bluffton has been rebuilt since it was organized in 1854 but the cemetery had grave markers dating to those early days. A newer church is located on the original site, across the road from the former site of the Signal Hotel. The mines did not produce a quality grade of ore and eventually closed, causing residents to leave the town.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

4. Rock Run, Cherokee County

Rock Run is a residential community in Cherokee County where a pocket of residents live in well-kept homes. But in the 1800s, it was a town that grew around the Rock Run Mine and Furnace. According to a 2004 history in The Calhoun Times, "An iron foundry was destroyed by the Union army during the Civil War but was rebuilt around 1879. The post office established in 1883, first was called Bass, probably after the operator of the foundry." The ca. 1890s commissary, shown above, still stands. Click here for a story and more photos, as well as a map.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Rock Run Mine and Furnace “flourished until the 1920s,” the article said. Today, the ca. 1890s commissary sits vacant across the street from the Rock Run Baptist Church. Next to the commissary is the home that once belonged to mine superintendent, J.M. Garvin, shown here.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Rock Run Baptist Church.

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(Source: Jimmy Emerson DVM)

Ruins of the furnace at Rock Run.

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(Source: Jimmy Emerson DVM)

Sign at Rock Run.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

5. Pleasant Gap, Cherokee County

The small community of Pleasant Gap in Cherokee County gets its name from its location in a "gap" of Frog Mountain. This photo shows the grist mill that remains at the site. Click here for a story and more photos, as well as a map.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Pleasant Gap was once a town surrounding a grist mill, shown here from a side view, just a few miles from the mining town of Rock Run. A post office was established in 1847, according to a 2004 article in The Calhoun Times. The post office operated until 1932.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

Pleasant Gap Cemetery.

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Kelly Kazek | kkazek@al.com

A kudzu-covered structure at Pleasant Gap.

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(Source: Josh Box/Underground Birmingham)

6. Praco, West Jefferson County

Praco was once bustling with miners who pulled coal from the earth for the Pratt Consolidated Coal Co., from which the town's name was derived. The mines were later owned by Alabama By-Products. The mine entrance remains at the Praco site with the 1929 stone sign, according to Josh Box of Underground Birmingham Facebook page.

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(Source: Jeff Newman/UndergroundBirmingham)

Today, an empty hulking coal silo and numerous roadbeds remain in the West Jefferson community, now owned by Walter Energy. Although the mine closed in the late 1950s, the town survived until 1981.

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(Source: Jeff Newman/Underground Birmingham)

The abandoned coal silo is one of the few structures left at the site of Praco. This photo shows the interior.

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(Source: Patricia Dickey Whitlock)

Company houses at Praco, ca. 1970s. They were built in the 1930s and torn down in the 1980s.

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