By Trelle Kolojay

Hidden space discovered under downtown Saskatoon

Mar 6, 2015 | 6:42 AM

While doing renovations in the basement of the Hotel Senator, the owners have unearthed a piece of history.

A brick archway and what looks like the beginning of a tunnel have been uncovered behind layers of dirt.

“This was the last area that we really have not been able to get into or uncover at the hotel and we were always wondering what was behind the brick walls or the stone walls and the area that was filled with dirt,” Chris Beavis, general manager of the Hotel Senator and co-owner of Winston’s English Pub and Grill, said.

The digging started last fall, with plans to create a brewery and cellar in an unused storage area.

“Right above here is Winston’s Pub and then over underneath the archway is the 21st Street sidewalk,” Beavis said, while standing in the tiny basement space.

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Now, this piece of history will get a new life.

“We will definitely be keeping the archway and featuring it,” Beavis said.

Because of structural restrictions, the hotel can’t do any more digging, so what exactly lies through the archway will remain a mystery.

However, 1912 building plans for the Hotel Senator, the Flanagan Hotel at the time, offer up a theory.

The plans show eight small squares off of main rooms in the basement which represent small storage areas like closets. These could have been used for extra storage, coal chutes or coal bins or a place to keep ashes from a boiler. The potential coal chutes or ash hoists could have had access from the sidewalk, which would explain their location underneath the 21st Street sidewalk.

Beavis said he hopes to continue work through the spring and summer and open the brewery and cellar to the public this fall.

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