The records of Ashland, Wisconsin are arranged into the following series based on city office or function: CITY ATTORNEY, COMMON COUNCIL, EDUCATION AND RECREATION, FINANCE AND ADMINISTRATION, FIRE AND POLICE COMMISSION, MATRON OF COUNTY REST ROOM, and MAYOR. Series and headings are arranged alphabetically and chronologically thereunder.
The best overview of city government can be found in the Common Council Proceedings. However, it should be noted that there are significant gaps in the Proceedings: pre-1897, 1900-1914, and June 1938-1943. Therefore, documents that would normally have been discarded for those time periods, such as routine committee reports, quarterly reports, and bids, have been retained since they provide the only picture of the city government for those years.
Researchers should be aware that there is not a consistent document numbering system within the COMMON COUNCIL headings Resolutions and Ordinances, and CLERK heading Chattel Mortgages; and occasional renumbering (i.e. starting over at 1). In most cases, there are also file numbers written on each document in addition to the standard resolution and ordinance numbering. The file numbers written on Resolutions and Ordinances appear to be a running count of all documents. The Chattel Mortgage numbers are occasionally based on the rank within alpha character; e g. T 1-84, L 1-37.
In some headings, such as the Board of Education and Vaughn Library Association, annual reports may include apportionment requests, and occasionally separate financial documents.
The CITY ATTORNEY series is made up of Expenses and Legal Opinions. The Expenses cover only one year: 1902. The Legal Opinions are principally related to claims against the city for property damage or personal injury. Each Opinion includes an explanation of the decision and sometimes supporting information. The Attorney’s conclusion is also recorded in the Council Proceedings and the claims themselves are a heading under the COMMON COUNCIL series.
The largest series in the records is from the COMMON COUNCIL with 16 headings. Most are self-explanatory, such as various Boards and Committees, petitions, proceedings, ordinances, and resolutions. Several headings deserve special mention. The Abstract of Title for the Bay City Slip provides the ownership history of the Slip, which is adjacent to the selected location for the Wisconsin Central Railway (later Soo Line) ore dock.
The Board of Health records include two volumes identified as 'health books.' Volume 2 provides reports of contagious diseases (and is continued in Volume 3), such as diphtheria, scarlet fever, small pox, and typhoid fever, with typhoid also given a separate section (pages 205-212). All reports include patient information and quarantine data. The reports for May 14, 1893 - May 4, 1895 are on pages 1-4 of Volume 2 and for May 12, 1895 - February 6, 1908 on pages 1-38 of Volume 3. The Undertaker reports for 1893-1895 are found in Volume 2, pages 173-204, and list names and causes of death. Since disease is so closely associated with water and sewer conditions, Volume 2, pages 5-170, also includes notice, orders, and permit applications related to sanitation; most interesting is the inclusion of water test information (Volume 2, pages 213-223). Ashland devoted considerable time and expense to improving water quality in an effort to reduce typhoid fever outbreaks, and as early as 1890 employed a Sanitary Policeman. Much of this information is expanded upon in Volume 4 of the minutes. That information includes water quality reports from bacteriologist H.L. Russell, later the Dean of Agriculture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison and the namesake of Russell Labs. There appears to have been close coordination between the Board of Health and the Board of Public Works.
There were actually three boards devoted to education: Board of Education, Board of Industrial Education, and Board of Vocational Education. The material from these boards consists of financial annual reports.
There is a small selection of Unsorted Reports which have been retained solely because they cover time periods not covered in the Proceedings, and provide the only view of the government for those time periods. The reports are primarily concerned with public works projects. The 1948 documents were retained as they cover Ashland's involvement in the State Centennial.
The EDUCATION AND RECREATION series includes three headings: Municipal Band, Park Commission, and the Vaughn Library Association. The city was proud of its musical heritage and much was made of its Municipal Band composed of boys from multiple school districts. In 1925 it was the largest boys' band in the world, “with 265 uniformed and playing members,” as reported in the April 20, 1925 edition of the Daily Press. The annual reports of the band provide financial information and note the band's activities over the year.
The Park Commission records are primarily composed of a volume of Minutes which detail plant lists for the various boulevards and parks, and design issues. Of particular interest is the June 16, 1919 “bear resolution,” formally declining the offer of two bears to the city. There is also a small amount of information related to Mount Hope Cemetery.
The Vaughn Library Association records consist of annual reports containing financial information, book counts, circulation figures, and sometimes a narrative of the year's highlights. The Library was founded by Mrs. Emeline Patrick Vaughn in 1886 as a self-financing entity, but by the 1930s the city was assuming expenses.
The FINANCE and ADMINISTRATION series is comprised of four headings; Assessor, Clerk, Comptroller, and Treasurer. The Assessor heading is wholly composed of the assessment cards, 1934, which are filed by subdivision. The cards provide a snapshot of properties in 1934 and most cards include a description of the property, owner or tenant information, land value factors and assessment summary. Some also include a sketch of the property. A table of the cards can be found in the appendix, by type of property (residential, mercantile, or manufacturing), area of city, and blocks within area.
The Clerk heading includes annual reports, chattel mortgages, and election canvassing board reports. Comptroller and Treasurer headings are entirely composed of annual reports. Most of the chattel mortgages are indexed by last name in original Volume 4 (Archives Volume 12).
The FIRE AND POLICE COMMISSION series is primarily concerned with hiring and firing personnel. The series contains three headings; Chief of Police annual reports, Commission minutes, and Fire Chief annual and building reports. The Chief of Police annual reports generally provide employment and expense totals, equipment counts, fine and bail income, prisoner expenses, and yearly arrest totals for various types of crimes, with arrest breakdowns by gender, age, marital status, nationality, occupation, month, and dispositions of cases. Arrest totals by officer are also enumerated, as are fugitive arrests. Later reports also list car accidents, and location within city. By the 1940s, the reports are single page affairs, listing major arrest categories, amount of bonds forfeited, number of 'lodgers,' and number of juvenile complaints.
The Commission Minutes contain information on individual fire and police personnel, including disciplinary matters and policy recommendations to the Common Council.
Fire Chief annual reports and building reports list number and types of alarms, monetary losses, insurance statistics, mileage, feet of hose laid, employment and apparatus figures, and specifics for each fire house and hose house. In certain instances, fire responses are analyzed to determine measures that may have affected the outcome of the fire call. Improvements, recommendations, and accidents are also routine report sections. More recent reports provide much less detail on the operations of the fire department, and generally include a building report which lists the value and type of new construction within the city for the year, with information on the owners of newly constructed residences, and alterations to existing buildings.
The MATRON OF COUNTY REST ROOM series has been retained more as a curiosity, and contains annual reports from 1926-1931, 1933-1938, which enumerate the visitors to the Rest Room by state and country, and includes running totals for the entire time frame. The county rest room had been requested by a local women's group, and was apparently open only to female visitors to the city, not residents. Other cities, such as Pasadena, California, also maintained public rest rooms with matron services, with some providing refreshments.
The MAYOR series consists of two biannual reports, 1929 and 1931, and are essentially 'State of the City' reports for the administration of Mayor M.E. Dillon.
