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Sunday Favorites: Ybor's Mysterious Web of Underground Tunnels

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In 1920, Prohibition was enacted, requiring businesses nationwide to adhere to new regulations. Although the law was intended to decrease violence, particularly domestic violence against women, it inadvertently led to a significant increase in organized crime.

At the time Tampa was a nucleus for cigar manufacturing, due to it’s close proximity and, at the time, strong relationship with Cuba. The Cigar making industry in Ybor City became the  cornerstone of Tampa’s economy. By 1929, Tampa’s cigar factories produced a record-breaking 504 million cigars annually, cementing its identity as the "Cigar City." Despite this success, the industry’s prominence began to wane during the decade as other sectors emerged.

.As detailed in Hampton Dunn's "Tampa’s Most Raucous Roarin’ Decade: The 1920s, Tampa's strategic coastal location made it a prime hub for smuggling operations. This led to the proliferation of speakeasies, moonshine production, and bootlegging, empowering criminal networks, including the local Italian mafia, who capitalized on the illegal alcohol trade. The resulting turf wars and widespread corruption, which even infiltrated law enforcement and politics, painted a picture of lawlessness in Tampa during the Roaring Twenties.

In 2018, construction workers near a historic bottling factory at 12th Street and 6th Avenue in Tampa, Florida, uncovered a sophisticated network of underground tunnels. The tunnels included tall curved arches made of brick, electrical wiring, a rail system, and double locks, indicating that whoever had constructed these tunnels, spared no expense. Researchers from the University of South Florida mapped the tunnels using laser scanning to create partial 3D models before they were sealed again.

One theory suggests that their original construction was part of a public works project, but the city has no official maps of them, adding to the intrigue. What’s even more strange, one of the last known access points was lost when a building burned down in 2001.

When they were first discovered, Dr. Gary Mormino, a history professor emeritus at the University of South Florida, theorized the tunnels were used for illicit activities, possibly to smuggle alcohol, drugs and even Chinese laborers and Chinese-Cuban prostitutes. Mormino noted the easy access during low tide and cover the water table could provide.

However, later that year, Tampa Bay History Center curator Rodney Kite-Powell, explored the tunnel system and  clarified that while it could theoretically have been used for smuggling, its primary purpose was as a storm and sanitary sewer. Built between 1885 and the late 1890s, the tunnel featured design elements and pipes consistent with 19th-century dual-use sewer systems seen in other cities, according to the Tampa Bay Times article “Historians now agree: Ybor City's tunnels were built as sewers, not smuggling routes” by Paul Guzzo. 

Although the Ybor tunnels seem to be sewers, their story still holds a certain fascination. I’d love to see them fully documented someday, but with more sections being filled in and access points disappearing due to construction, it feels unlikely we’ll ever get the full picture. For now, I’ll enjoy piecing together their history through the bits of documentation that remain, always curious about what stories they might still hold.

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