 "This place in California is called the ‘City of Souls’, there are many times more dead bodies buried here than the population")
Colma, a small town in California, is known worldwide for its amazing and mysterious history. It is often called the ‘City of Spirits’, but its real name is Colma. The city covers just 1.9 square miles and has a population of less than 2,000. But there are about 1.5 million people buried in 17 cemeteries. This small town has produced some of the biggest names in the industry such as denim founder Levi Strauss, Bank of America founder AP Giannini and famous baseball player Joe DiMaggio.
In 1848, gold was unexpectedly discovered in California. This discovery caused a stir in America and people fled to California in hopes of getting rich. San Francisco’s population grew dramatically, rising from 812 to 25,000 in two years. As the population grew, San Francisco’s cemeteries began to fill up. Thus began the practice of burial in Colma, and the first cemetery was established here in 1887.
In San Francisco, the belief slowly grew that living near cemeteries spread disease. Given this alarming state of affairs, in 1914 city officials decided that no one would be buried there anymore. Along with this, it was also decided that the bodies buried in the old cemeteries should be shifted elsewhere so that the land there could be used for other purposes. After 1914, San Francisco officials ordered that all graves be moved out of the city. There were about two dozen cemeteries in San Francisco at the time. Dead bodies were removed from these cemeteries and taken to Colma. At the beginning of the 20th century, around 1.5 lakh bodies were transferred to Colma. Since then the body count in Colma has increased.
Today only 1,800 people live in Colma, but the number of bodies buried in its cemeteries is more than 1.5 million. The ratio of the dead to the living in the cemeteries here is 1:833. This means that there are 833 corpses for every living person in Colma. That is why this city is called ‘city of souls’.