Humberstone and Santa Laura Saltpeter Works

UNESCO World Heritage Site (Humberstone And Santa Laura Saltpeter Works, 2005); Abandoned Company Towns Of The Nitrate Boom In The Atacama · Pozo Almonte, Tarapaca

Humberstone and Santa Laura are two abandoned saltpeter works in the Atacama desert inland from Iquique, the best preserved of the hundreds of nitrate company towns that made northern Chile rich from the late nineteenth century until synthetic fertilisers killed the trade. Humberstone was a complete town: rows of workers' houses, a church, a market, a school, a hotel, a theatre and a swimming pool built from the iron hull of a ship, all laid out on a grid in the empty pampa and all abandoned when the works closed around 1960. Santa Laura, a short distance away, preserves the processing plant, with its tall leaching sheds, rusting machinery and chimney. Together they are a World Heritage Site and, for a long time, were on the list of heritage in danger. Walking through the empty streets and the theatre, with the wind rattling corrugated iron, is eerie and moving, and the small museums tell the hard story of the miners, the pampinos, and their strikes. It is hot, dusty and shadeless by day. Iquique, on the coast, is about forty minutes away.

Ruta 16, Humberstone, Pozo Almonte, Tarapaca, Pozo Almonte, Tarapaca, Chile

Open daily in daylight hours; confirm current times. The two works share one entry ticket. The site is fully exposed to desert sun and wind. Former residents gather for a reunion festival in November.

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