Once upon a time, diamond stones were found everywhere. The people, the noise, the busy diamond mine… and one of the richest cities in the world. A hundred years ago, most of the wealth was in the hands of those who lived here. But today it is a ghost town..!
Many buildings and factories once stood here, but today only a few dilapidated buildings remain. Those buildings are full of sand dunes. It is regarding a small town called Kolmanskop located in the southern part of the vast Namib desert in West Africa. How did this place where people lived happily become an abandoned ghost town without people and movement..? What is the story of Colemanscope..?
In 1908, a railroad worker named Zacharias Levala, while removing soil from the Namibian railway tracks, came across some bright stones. With this, the fate of this place, which was an ordinary town, changed completely. As soon as he got the stones, Levala showed them to his boss, the German. As soon as he saw the bright stone, he realized that it was no ordinary stone and asked the employee to search once more at the place where the stone was found. After searching, he also found many such shining stones. The whole place was found to be full of diamonds.
Although the boss tried to hide the fact that he got the stones, the incident spread like wildfire in the area. People living in Germany started arriving there in droves. Everyone’s goal was to mine the diamond. A worker who was working here at that time returned from here with a hand full of diamonds.
As people started arriving in droves, the German government soon turned it into a restricted zone. Such a ban was imposed to prevent private companies from outside from transporting diamonds and for the government to own the diamonds.
Thus, in the first six years of diamond mining, more than 4 million carats of diamonds have been excavated from here. It accounts for regarding twelve percent of the world’s diamond production. Two years later in 1914, more than a thousand kilos of diamonds were found here. At that time, the number of people living here was only regarding a thousand. As wealth grew through diamonds, Colemanskop’s fame slowly began to rise.
Later, their goal is to build an empire like Germany here. As everyone wanted, a city like Germany arose in Kolmanskop. Houses, theaters, hospitals, schools and bars were all built as per the wishes of the people there.
Due to intensive mining, by the 1930s the diamond here began to slowly run out. By the time the diamond started to run out, people slowly left the place and started moving to other places. People went to tapi another diamond deposit regarding 300 km from here. Thus the area reached the brink of destruction and was officially closed.
The city became like a haunted house as the residents abandoned their properties and homes. Only small buildings remain here today. A desert-like area. But in 1980, all interesting buildings and museums were re-established here. Today, Colemanscope is located in a restricted zone controlled by Namdeb Diamond Corporation, a joint venture owned by De Beers and the Namibian government. Colemanscope now has a different kind of beauty. Tourists and photographers come here in large numbers. Colemanscope is also a favorite of photographers and has been used many times for many films and television series. This Colemanscope can be seen in films like Dust Devil and The King is Alive.
The rise and fall of this country has many lessons for the world. Today, Kolmanskop is just a place for tourists to come and go. The old city, constantly crowded, noisy, and full of diamonds and money, lives only in memories.
Kolmanskop, The ghost town
