Grand Lake St. Marys
Grand Lake Saint Marys Grand Lake |
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Coordinates | 40 ° 31 '36 " N , 84 ° 30' 3" W | ||||||
Data on the structure | |||||||
Lock type: | lock | ||||||
Construction time: | Early 19th century | ||||||
Data on the reservoir | |||||||
Altitude (at congestion destination ) | 265 m | ||||||
Water surface | 51 km² | ||||||
Reservoir length | 13 km | ||||||
Reservoir width | 4.7 km | ||||||
the largest artificial lake in the world when it was built |
The Grand Lake St. Marys (official, but rarely used name: Grand Lake , literally "Big Lake") is an artificial lake in the counties Mercer and Auglaize in the US state Ohio .
history
The lake was created from 1837 as a reservoir for the Miami-Erie Canal near the eponymous place St. Marys . When it was completed in 1845, it was the largest man-made lake in the world with an area of 54 km².
After oil was discovered in the area in the 1890s, a number of derricks stood in the lake, which is rarely more than 1.5 to 2 meters deep.
In 1949, Ohio's first state parks were established with Grand Lake and a few other reservoirs along the Miami-Erie Canal . The state park covers the entire lake area. At 2.4 km², Grand Lake St. Marys State Park's portion of the land area is relatively small. Today the lake is primarily used as a recreation area. There is a campsite on the lakeshore with 198 caravan spaces.
Web links
- Grand Lake St. Marys State Park at Ohio State Parks & Watercraft (English)
- Grand Lake in the Geographic Names Information System of the United States Geological Survey