| West view towards State rd in Pompeii. The depot stood on the right. Jessup's Elevator was on the left which is now gone along with the rail spur. It is summer of 2000 and the new ties on the branch are now in place. TSB track machines are parked on the passing siding. |
| OLA 1889 |
| When travelers zip across the TSB grade crossing going north on US-127, to the right and on the south side of the tracks was the village of Ola. Mr. Alvin Shaver, of St. Johns, had a big hand in the start of Ola. He named the new village after his daughter, Ola. Mr. Shaver owned the eighty acres of land on which the new village was platted. He secured a contract with Mr. Robinson to build a depot and had a crew of men clearing the land and putting up buildings. Passenger trains stopped only on being flagged. Ola is only two miles from Pompeii so it was never considered as becoming a regular station. The post office was established May 26, 1887 and removed in December, 1904. Ola is significant in the fact of sugar beets. It was the first major beet weighing station in Michigan. The track between Carson City and Ashley was a major factor in the transportation of sugar beets in the 1930's. Between Carson and Middleton there were two sidings for the loading of sugar beets. One could handle 6 cars and the other 8 cars. Between Ola and Ashley there were two more sidings for loading sugar beets. These two were able to handle 7 and 4 rail cars. In 1997 there were no railroad customers at Ola. A short spur was still in place and the railroad used it for maintenance equipment doing track work. There also was a huge pile of old ties there removed from the road bed. |
| This map from Don Pertner who lived in Ashley in this time period. |
| ASHLEY CIRCA. 1925 |
| North view of Ashley station in the early 1900's. GTW's "Turkey Trail" branches off the Ann Arbor to the left. Photo from Ithaca Library. |
| Track gang at the water tank and section house in the west end of Ashley. See drawing above. Photographer unknown. |
| Official Guide 1899. |
| It is the 24th of June 1993 with TSB 392 going west past the Ashley yard limit board with some empty grain cars for Middleton. |
| TSB 388 & 393 headed north thru Ashley past the "Turkey Trail" branch. Date June 2, 1992. |
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| Photographs by Merritt B.Scharnweber unless otherwise noted. |
| Page-6 |
| In the fall of 1881 there were four families in the Ashley area. Daniel Robbenolt, Abram Shellenbarger, Charles Markham, and William Proctor. L.M. Hutchinson arrived, making a total of five. Ansel H. Phinney, George P. Dudly and Miles Bullock, formerly of Howell, MI., assumed that the Toledo, Ann Arbor and Northern Michigan Railroad Co. would adopt the location where Ashley now stands as a site for a station. They purchased the land. Miles Bullock surveyed and prepared the original plat of Ashley in the fall of 1883. It was certified in January, 1884 and recorded March 3, 1884 by John Sinclair, Register of Deeds. The village was named Ashley, in honor of James M. Ashley, the promoter of the Toledo, Ann Arbor and Northern Michigan Railroad. When the T., A.A. & N.M. R.R. came through Ashley in 1884 the original depot was built at the corner of Sterling and Oak Street. This building burned in April of 1890 and a second depot was built just north of the junction with the Toledo, Saginaw & Muskegon Railway. The depot was used by both railroads. This depot was dismantled in April, 1973. |
