Anti-Zombie Fortress — Tall concrete tower building with grid of small square windows, overgrown with ivy at its base in a field.

Anti-Zombie Fortress

2011imageclassic

Published October 26, 2026

Anti-Zombie Fortress is the nickname Reddit gave to the Shime coal mine's winding tower in Fukuoka, Japan, after user Mitsjol posted its photo to /r/pics on April 1, 20111. Commenters flooded the thread with Photoshop edits picking apart structural flaws and sketching their own undead-proof upgrades. Within a day, a follow-up thread, Minecraft replicas, and a mobile anti-zombie fortress design sent the joke onto the Reddit front page3.

subreddit origin memes photoshop memes early 2010s memes japanese internet memes viral photo memes

Overview

At its core, Anti-Zombie Fortress is a conceptual joke format on Reddit where a photo of a strange or defensible structure gets reframed as hypothetical shelter against a zombie outbreak1. The original post centered on the Shime coal mine's winding tower, a reinforced concrete shaft head rising nearly 48 meters out of flat ground in Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan2. Its narrow footprint, few openings, and sheer vertical walls read like a defender's dream, which is what prompted the half-serious title.

Commenters typically respond with Photoshop edits that annotate weak points, add moats, drawbridges, or sniper nests, and work out food and water logistics for a long siege1. Minecraft players rebuilt the shaft tower block for block, and later threads one-upped the original with wilder designs, including a mobile anti-zombie fortress on tank treads3. The tone is engineering-nerd humor layered over zombie fiction tropes, not fear.

Origin & Background

Platform
Reddit (/r/pics)
Key People
Mitsjol
Date
2011

On April 1, 2011, Reddit user Mitsjol submitted a photo of the Shime coal mine to /r/pics with the title "This would make an awesome anti-zombie fortress"1. The thread drew hundreds of comments within hours as users debated whether the shaft tower could really hold off a horde and started posting their own edited versions. In similar spirit to earlier Reddit conceptual jokes like Rocket Propelled Chainsaw and Chinese Gundam, the discussion stayed playful and iterative6.

The building itself, formally called the Winding Tower of the Shime coal mine, was erected between 1941 and 1943, operated for 21 years, and was shut down in 19612. It stands 47.65 meters tall and is one of only three winding tower mine shafts still standing in Japan. The Japanese government designated the site a national cultural heritage property in July 2007 and reclassified it as an "important cultural property" in December 2009, which is why it is still well-preserved and reachable by public transit2.

How It Spread

The original Mitsjol thread climbed the /r/pics front page on April 1, 2011, pulling in Photoshop edits and comment chains that debated real-world zombie siege logistics1. The Shime coal mine was already a known destination for haikyo (廃虚), Japanese urban exploration of abandoned ruins, so photographers and travel bloggers had been circulating images of the tower since the mid-2000s2. Reddit's reframing added a joke layer on top of that existing documentation.

On April 2, 2011, a follow-up Reddit thread titled "I see your zombie fortress and i raise you a zombie fortress" hit the front page the same day it went up3. That second round produced its own Minecraft replica4 and the much-shared mobile anti-zombie fortress design, which cleared more than 600 upvotes within hours5. From there the format joined Reddit's rotating catalog of hypothetical survival jokes, resurfacing whenever someone posts a photo of an unusually defensible-looking building.

Timeline

1943

Construction of the Shime coal mine's winding tower is completed in Fukuoka Prefecture, Japan[2].

1961

The Shime coal mine shuts down after 21 years of operation[2].

2007-07

The Japanese government designates the Shime coal mine site a national cultural heritage property[2].

2009-12

The site is reclassified as an "important cultural property"[2].

2011-04-01

Reddit user Mitsjol posts the photo of the tower to /r/pics as "This would make an awesome anti-zombie fortress," launching the joke format[1].

2011-04-02

A follow-up /r/pics thread, "I see your zombie fortress and i raise you a zombie fortress," reaches the front page and spawns a mobile fortress spin-off with over 600 upvotes[3].

How to Use This Meme

A typical Anti-Zombie Fortress post pairs a photo of a lonely tower, bunker, offshore platform, or odd piece of industrial architecture with a caption claiming it would survive a zombie siege. Replies often include annotated edits that mark weak spots, propose extensions such as walls or drawbridges, or recreate the structure in Minecraft3. The common convention is to argue the structure's merits on practical grounds, food storage, line of sight, water source, before someone points out it has no toilet.

Frequently Asked Questions