Cross a closed bridge, hike two miles deep into the forest, and you'll find Lester, or what's left of it.
It was founded as a town for workers, not necessarily a family village, though a little community did grow up. Originally a logging camp, it was named Lester after a telegraph operator when the Northern Pacific Railway Company set up camp there to build a railroad across mountainous Stampede Pass in 1892.
The logging industry was driven out by forest fires in 1902, but became the town's primary industry again in the 1940s and '50s. At its peak, Lester was home to about a thousand people. But the rail industry waned and jobs dried up. Tacoma cut off access to the one road leading to Lester to protect the quality of drinking water for the Green River Watershed. People moved away, until eventually there were only five students in the Lester school district and the State closed it down. Now, all that remains are dilapidating sheds and houses, the phantom of a once-thriving community.
Lester's last resident, Gertrude Murphy, died in 2002 at age 99. Without anyone living there, Lester died too. Gertrude remembered Lester fondly, as a bucolic forest town. "Once, just once, I saw the fog freeze on the trees, it was so cold," she said. "It was lacy and light and feathery, just beautiful. In the fall, when the vine maples came in, they were like big bouquets all over the hills."