Discovering Ashland's Hidden Tunnels

ASHLAND - It seems as if every town in the Northland has its own unique history and Ashland is no exception.Underneath the streets of Ashland used to be an entire city.Due to a tragic accident and years of deterioration the underground streets were filled in. All it takes is a walk down the stairs to find what's left of Ashland's so called underground city."It was dark and dreary yeah there was no lighting for sure," said museum manager Jan Cameron. If you look at Ashland's landscape now it's pretty flat but it didn't start out that way. In the 1800's the town was uneven and fairly swampy. When building the town early settlers created structures that matched the natural landscape. So some businesses ended up being in the bottom of a ravine."Instead of having this deep ravine for people to walk through or to drive through or get back and forth with their horses and buggies. They started to put boardwalks in," said Cameron. The boardwalks were similar to railroad bridges and were built level to the top of Ashland's rolling ravines. So buildings in the valleys w ere underneath Ashland's Main Street."Pretty soon when you got to about 100 years bridges that were underneath the road started to collapse," said Cameron. For 100 years that's the way Ashland was."It took some heavy traffic. We had the trolley line, we had a bus line, we had trucks that came down this street so it was pretty sturdy," said... It was a tragic accident triggering the city to eliminate the boardwalk streets."We did have a snow plow go through and that was when the city became really aware that something had to be done," said Cameron. In 1980 the lower level shops were boarded up and the once deep ravines were filled with sand leaving the basements of Ashland's oldest buildings with doors and windows leading nowhere."It gives you just kind of an eerie feeling knowing that people could go out those walls and now it's completely enclosed," said Cameron. There's only a handful of buildings left with lingering history hidden in the basement. Two of them being Ashland's museum and the new location of the Chequamegon Food Co-op. So next time you're driving down Ashland's Main Street you'll think of the unplanned history that's left stories and hidden treasures buried and boarded up."It really wasn't a system it was just the way it ended up being built," said Cameron. For more pictures and information on how Ashland used to be visit the historical society located in Ashland's downtown.