Joshua Tree-Adjacent Ghost Town Sold To Mysterious Buyer

Land may be a premium in many parts of California, but a so-called ghost town in Riverside County took land sale to the next level.

According to Securities and Exchange Commission records, Eagle Mountain has sold to a mysterious buyer for nearly $22.6 million. The buyer, Ecology Mountain Holdings, has little public presence aside from a business address in Cerritos.

Eagle Mountain, located near the southeast corner of Joshua Tree National Park, spans some 10,000 acres. The “town”  was founded as a company town for Kaiser Steel Mine in 1948, at one point home to some 4,000 residents. 

Kaiser phased out the mine in the 1980s and Eagle Mountain’s residents were evicted in 1983. The area then became home to the Eagle Mountain Community Correctional Facility, which closed after a deadly riot in 2003.

According to SFGate, the Eagle Mountain Regional Elementary School is still open, serving about two dozen students.

No word on what Ecology Mountain Holdings plans to do with the newly purchased land.