Ashland

Ashland, on State Highway 154 fourteen miles southeast of Gilmer in extreme southeastern Upshur County, was established around 1845. In antebellum Texas the settlement served as a shipping and marketing point for plantations along the bend of Cypress Creek. A post office under the name Asbury opened there in 1894. By 1896 the community had a sawmill, a general store, Baptist and Methodist churches, two doctors, and an estimated population of 110. In 1902 the community was renamed Ashland. At its height around 1914 Ashland had a bank, a Masonic lodge, four general stores, a cotton gin, and a population of 250. After World War I , however, the town began to decline. The post office was closed in 1921, and by 1933 the population had fallen to 175. In the mid-1930s the community had a church, a store, and a number of scattered houses. By 1945 the population had fallen to twenty. In the mid-1960s Ashland had a church, a cemetery, and a few houses. In 1990 the church and cemetery were still at the site, and Ashland was a dispersed rural community with an estimated population of twenty. By 2000 the population had grown to forty-five.