Ashland once had its own curious and spooky tourist attraction. It was called Satan’s Sulphur Grotto, a small cave-like space dug into the bank on the east side of Ashland Creek approximately across from the upper duck pond.
The Ashland Lithians, a group that worked with the Chamber of Commerce, probably created the grotto. Whoever did placed rocks in the cave and piped sulphur water to bubble through the rocks like a natural spring and then flow down to Ashland Creek.
Although the time period was pre-1920, the cave was sophisticatedly lined with blue and red lights that “made things look eerie and off in the distance.” Combined with the sulphur fumes, the grotto came, as one account described it, “nearer to affording a semblance of a visit to the bowels of the earth than seems possible.”
The Ashland Lithians greeted visiting officials at the cave, which provided an opportunity for little boys to “jump out and scare people.” Older boys preferred frightening girlfriends inside.
The grotto was closed and filled in when it had become a refuse dumping ground.
Sources: A Bit of Old Ashland. Booklet ed. Ashland, Ore.: 8th grade students at Ashland Junior High School, 1978. 87. Print; "Ashland Grows While Lithia Flows." Tidings 19 June 1910 [Ashland, Ore.] . Web. 25 Oct. 2015. http://oregonnews.uoregon.edu/lccn/sn85042399/1916-06-19/ed-1/seq-1/ocr.txt; National Register of Historic Places Inventory—Nomination Form . U.S. Department of the Interior, 1975. Web. 25 Oct. 2015.
