Дельтон көлі және ауылдың тарихы

the village

Lake Delton is a man made freshwater lake in Sauk County in central Wisconsin. For much of 2008, it was a mostly empty lake basin after a portion of a county highway that forms part of the dike wall eroded on June 9, 2008, under the pressure of floods in the area. The resulting washout caused the lake to empty into the Wisconsin River, leaving behind only rainwater pools and the flow from Dell Creek. By March 2009, major repairs to correct the problem were completed, and the lake was allowed to refill. Minor repairs were expected to continue after that time, but the lake is now completely refilled and has been usable since Memorial Day weekend of 2009. Resorts and tourist attractions line its banks. The lake was the site of Tommy Bartlett's Thrill Show, which featured acrobatic water skiing.

In 1926, Chicago construction company owner William J. Newman decided to build a resort area in the tiny Delton, Wisconsin area (as the community of Lake Delton had been known at the time). Newman engaged a local land agent to purchase tracts of land along both banks of a stretch of Dell Creek. After taking title to the tracts, Newman brought engineers and construction crews to the area, who built a 30 feet (9 m) high dam near the confluence of Dell Creek and the Wisconsin River. They built a 1000 feet (305 m) dike along the dam. They also created of artificial shoreline for the resort area. To decorate his own summer home on Lake Delton, Newman transported several sculptures and concrete blocks he saved from the rubble of Midway Gardens (1913, Chicago, Illinois; demolished 1929), the last of Frank Lloyd Wright's Prairie Style buildings, which had stood near the Lake Michigan shoreline in downtown Chicago. Newman's company had been hired in 1929 to demolish the structure. Years later, when Wright heard of the survival of the sculptures and blocks, he purchased them and they remained with his estate. As recently as 1999, a block was found buried on the property of Newman's old summer home on Lake Delton and was donated to the Chicago Historical Society. Newman ran the resort until the Great Depression caused him to file for bankruptcy protection. The Lake Delton enterprise was barely able to survive, and in the 1940s Newman's interest was sold to an investment group, called the Lake Delton Development Corporation. The Lake Delton resort area was more successful after World War II, when tourism increased in the Dells area with Tommy Bartlett's water show. By the 1980s, the Lake Delton strip had become home to waterparks, resorts and other recreational facilities that made it a mecca for travelers from across the United States. In fact, the local village website boasts that "4.5 million visitors come to the Wisconsin Dells Lake Delton area each year." The lake level was drawn down 8 feet (2 m) for repairs on the dam in 1983. The inflow recharged the lake in 15 days. Much of the shoreline of Lake Delton has been developed with summer homes, year round homes and condominiums. About 20 resorts surround the lake. Prior to the 2008 washout, the lake had poor water quality, which is common to impoundments in southwest Wisconsin. Some of the water quality problems may have been due to construction site erosion, as well as rural nonpoint source pollution. The lake also had nuisance aquatic weed growth that has required chemical treatment. The fishery of the Lake Delton was northern pike, walleye, largemouth bass, channel catfish and panfish.