Foss Lake before Foss Lake
I received an email over the weekend from someone wondering if there were any maps of the Foss Lake area before the lake was there.
First thing I did was to find out when the dam was built. A good resource for this is the U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Reclamation web site's Dataweb (www.usbr.gov).
According to them Foss Dam was constructed between 1958 and 1961.
Next thing I looked for was a map of Oklahoma prior to 1958 or at least before 1961. The Oklahoma Department of Transportation has an archive of maps from 1873 through 2004.
I first looked over the 1961 map and found Foss Lake.
Then I took a look at the 1957 map (Oklahoma's Golden Anniversary). No Foss Lake.
Going even further back to the 1907 map, there isn't even a road there.
Now compare the above to the 2005 map.
First thing I did was to find out when the dam was built. A good resource for this is the U.S. Department of the Interior's Bureau of Reclamation web site's Dataweb (www.usbr.gov).
According to them Foss Dam was constructed between 1958 and 1961.
Next thing I looked for was a map of Oklahoma prior to 1958 or at least before 1961. The Oklahoma Department of Transportation has an archive of maps from 1873 through 2004.
I first looked over the 1961 map and found Foss Lake.
Then I took a look at the 1957 map (Oklahoma's Golden Anniversary). No Foss Lake.
Going even further back to the 1907 map, there isn't even a road there.
Now compare the above to the 2005 map.