Boomtown

In 1875, the Horn Silver Mine was established in the red rock cliffs of southwestern Utah and the town of Frisco was born. Within ten years, over sixty million dollars worth of gold, silver and other precious metals were exported from its rich mines. Rumors quickly spread about the new boomtown’s six thousand inhabitants, its numerous saloons and its grisly murders. Frisco gained a reputation for being one of the wildest towns in the Wild West. When the town’s main silver mine collapsed at the turn of the century, the tremors were so intense that, according to legend, it shook the structures in the town so violently that windows shattered. In 1929, the population of Frisco dipped below one hundred. As suddenly as it shot up, the boomtown became a ghost town. Abandoned homes and shops, rusted mining equipment and a small graveyard were left behind as the only evidence of its existence.

‘Boomtown’ blends serendipitously found audio interviews of the town sheriff and other remaining inhabitants, recorded just before their deaths, with images of the decaying ghost town in 2011. We get to know Sy Perkins, who “drifted in with a circus,” ran makeshift whiskey distilleries illegally, and may have killed his own wife. Or we hear of Sheriff Pearson, whose “quick-triggered fingers” laid down the law “with the simple philosophy that dead men give no trouble.” Letting the community speak for itself, this film rediscovers the nigh forgotten characters, stories, rumors and legends of Frisco, Utah.