One-resident Wyoming town now for sale

An undated picture of the main sign in Buford, Wyoming, when it had twice the population it does today. / Wikimedia Commons

(CBS/AP) BUFORD, Wyo. - What's advertised as the smallest town in the United States will be going to the highest bidder.

Buford is located between Cheyenne and Laramie in southeast Wyoming. The bidding starts at $100,000 at auction Thursday.

Whoever wins the town along Interstate 80 will get a gas station and convenience store, a schoolhouse from 1905, a cabin, a garage, 10 acres of land, and a three-bedroom home.

The town has just one inhabitant, Don Sammons, who bought the place in 1992. He plans to retire from his unofficial title as "mayor" of the unincorporated community and managing his businesses, and move on.

"I'm in semi-retirement. I have moved to Colorado, although I still stay here one or two nights a week," Sammons told CBS affiliate KGWN in Cheyenne.

The town traces its origins to the 1860s and the construction of the Transcontinental Railroad and had as many as 2,000 residents before the railroad was rerouted.

Sammons insists that being the only resident was not lonely.

"People fly from all over the world to come to Yellowstone and Jackson and when they land at the airport in Denver I'm usually their first stop if they need gas or time to get out of the car and stretch," Sammons told KGWN.

[MikeJN77]

Back in April of '02, I was driving back home from CA to NJ after getting out of the service. Rt. 80 all the way. I saw this sign and noticed the population which made me stop my truck on the side of the road and take nearly the same picture you see here. It was weird to see it in the news 10 years later!