Perry County was once a mining county, part of the Black Diamonds Coal Mining Region. It is the home of New Lexington, and many ailing or missing mining communities. More recently, the DeRolph decision on Ohio's school funding situation came out of Perry County, where the schools are some of the poorest in the nation. The ghost towns I know anything about are listed below.
Small commercial center centered around a Methodist Church on a hill. Lived from 1860 through the early 1900's. Today only a small plaque marks Chapel Hill's location.
The town that had everything. San Toy boomed in the early twentieth century but dried up when its two mines went bust. During the span of ten years it went from having a hospital, theater, and streetcar line to having nothing but fields full of foundations, bricked-up mine shafts, and a still-standing jailhouse. The relics of San Toy are easy to visit on San Toy Road in Perry County.
