Doug Guller, who owns a bar and restaurant chain in Texas, purchased the long-abandoned Texas town of Bankersmith after seeing an ad on Craigslist.
To shake things up, he renamed the town Bikinis.
Yes, I said Bikinis.
It’s to expand on the bar/restaurant combo Bikinis, which he also created. The eatery, opened in 2001, is a place where women serve drinks and food in bikinis.
“Bikinis, Texas, will be a world-class destination, and I am thrilled to expand the Bikinis brand to include town ownership,” Guller said to the Statesman. “There can’t be a better way to put Bikinis on the map, literally.”
Guller plans to host events in the town and he is hoping the first one will be this fall. He purchased the town for an undisclosed amount.
Bankersmith/Bikinis isn’t the only town put up for sale recently. In April, an unidentified buyer from Vietnam purchased the town of Buford, Wyoming for $900,000. It had a population of one – Don Sammons. Sammons moved there with his wife in 1980 and purchased the town in 1992, six years after his wife died. The 61-year-old Sammons decided to sell the town and move in with his son in Colorado.
Bankersmith was founded in 1913 as a railroad town. The population dwindled after the tracks were abandoned in 1935, and by 1949 there were just 20 residents. Today there are none, but that may change. Especially if the town is aptly-named.
The Wandering Mind 