54 REPORT OF COMMISSIONER OF FISH AND FISHERIES. 



21. ASHLAND AND VICINITY, ASHLAND COUNTY, WISCONSIN. 



Description of the town. — Ashland, at the head of Chaquamegon Bay, 

 about 16 miles from Bayfield, was settled about 1865, but continued 

 small and unimportant until railroad communication was established 

 between it and the interior. In 1885 it was a town of 5,000 inhabitants, 

 with two railroads, and is a favorite summer resort for the people of the 

 northwest. Its business interests are largely confined to lumbering 

 and the shipping of lumber and iron ore from the interior, but its advan- 

 tageous location makes it available as a leading port for lake traffic. 



Origin and history of the pound net fishery . — The fisheries are relatively 

 of very little importance, as their location at the head of the bay necessi- 

 tates a long trip to the fishing-grounds. The fishermen find it more 

 convenient to locate at Bayfield, and those inclined to this occupation 

 have, as a rule, moved to that place. Though of little importance as a 

 fishing town, Ashland, according to Mr. Nelson Boutin, of Bayfield, 

 deserves the credit of having had the first pound-net fished in the 

 waters of Lake Superior. This, he states, was set by a man named 

 St. Germain, in 1869, but the catch was quite small. In 1870, Mr. 

 Boutin came to Ashland with pound-nets from Lake Michigan, where 

 he had been fishing in various localities along the western shore between 

 the northern end of Green Bay and Chicago. He set three nets along 

 the shore in the immediate vicinity of the village, and in three weeks 

 caught 1,100 half-barrels of large fish, throwing away as many more of 

 a size that would now be considered marketable. Another fisherman 

 put in a pound-net at Ashland the same year. The next year, finding 

 the location inconvenient for the prosecution of the fishery, Mr. Boutin 

 and his brothers, who were all experienced and energetic fishermen, re- 

 moved to Bayfield, though for several years they set and fished a few 

 pound-nets near Ashland, in addition to those at Bayfield and the 

 Apostle Islands. From that time to the present other parties have set 

 a few pounds in the vicinity, residents of Ashland have fished in the 

 upper bay and about the Apostle Islands, and two or three firms have 

 at various times bought fish from Ashland and Bayfield fishermen and 

 shipped to the interior. In the year 1885 there was one firm, the 

 Ashland Fish Company, sending boats to the Apostle Islands and along 

 the outer shores, buying fresh fish from the fishermen and shipping to 

 St. Paul and to smaller towns in Wisconsin and Minnesota. 



Present condition of the Ashland fisheries.— The Ashland Fish Com- 

 pany is also engaged in fishing, buying its apparatus at Bayfield. In 

 1885 the firm owned and operated twenty pound-nets, selling the salt 

 fish to Bayfield parties and landing the fresh fish at Ashland for ship- 

 ment. Another resident of the town fished two pound-nets, but the 

 catch was largely sold to Bayfield dealers. In addition, three gill-nei 

 crews, residents of the town, fished during a greater part of the sum- 

 mer, disposing of their catch at Bayfield. The total amount of capital 



