Forgotten Brewery Caves - Ellsworth, Wisconsin

Ellsworth Wisconsin is a sleepy little place.  It was established just before the Civil War, and was renamed in honor of Colonel Elmer Ellsworth, one of the first Union casualties of that conflict.

As you drive along Main street you see this off to the south:

These cover the entrances to brewery caves.  As seems often to be the case there are three of them, connected by cross passages.  They were standing open when I stopped for a look, so I did not think a brief visit was out of line.

For some reason the vaults and hallways are full of this odd scaffolding.  These would be worthless for support beams, and the cave in any case seems "rock solid".  It almost looks as if somebody had in mind to put walls up in there.

More of the same, with loose planks laying about.  An odd project that started building in a half dozen spots and finished none!

It has a sort of Old West gold mine look to it.  The green stuff in the distance is the moss/algae you often find in such places.

Way in the back we find a new wall of cinder blocks.  Somebody had an idea going here.

It is a rather pleasant location, right out front is a scenic little stream.

There is very little information about the brewery in Ellsworth.  It almost certainly predates the earliest reference I have found to date, which has it in operation in the mid 1890s and owned by a fellow named Julius Diebnow.

Overall the Ellsworth brewery cave is of fairly standard design, but it does have one interesting feature......you can buy it if you want to! Here is the real estate listing.  The asking price seems modest for this pretty little spot, but it should be noted that they want to sell it as a package deal with the house that stands nearby.
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Addendum:  The half-hearted construction project inside these caves continues to intrigue me.  It looks a little too elaborate for a "Haunted Halloween" venue such as we saw in Hudson.  In fact for that you would probably want there to be cool exposed stone walls. No, this has more of the look of a failed Rec Room project.

I am disdainful of the modern term "Man Cave".  The implication of it is of a single room ghetto/quarantine ward where the grunting, malodorous Y-chromosome afflicted member of the household is to be contained.  Presumably freeing up the rest of the house for Scrapbooking, quilting and potted plants.

But if you were ever going to build a Man Cave that would meet with my approval, constructing it inside an actual cave might just be sufficient!