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VISITOR GUIDE Devil’s Lake State Park
OFFICIAL 2012
A Curious History ................................... 3 Healthy Forest .......................................... 9 Is Devil’s Lake Your Special Place? ....... 10 Nature Center ........................................ 25 Get Outdoors! Wisconsin ..................... 25 Kids! ....................................................... 26 An Unusual Geology ............................. 29 Driving Tour and Map ........................... 30 Snakes .................................................... 35 Badger’s and Wolves and Bears! ........... 37 Ice Age National Scientific Reserve ..... 38 Parfrey’s Glen ......................................... 39 Ancient Stories ...................................... 43 Ancient Mounds ..................................... 44 Natural Bridge State Park ..................... 45 Historical Devil’s Lake Map ................... 46 Depth Map .............................................. 47 Wintertime ............................................. 49 Bat Condos ............................................. 50 Badger Army Ammunition Plant ........... 54 101 Things to do ..................................... 55 Concessions ............................................ 62
SUMMER SCHEDULE ........................ 13-23 GROUP CAMP MAP ................................53 CAMPGROUND MAPS ..................... 56-57 ADMISSION INFORMATION ................ 58 EMERGENCY INFORMATION .............. 59 PARK/TRAIL MAP ............................ 60-61
Hikers about 1900 A Curious History
wide range of improbable events and remarkable people.
Devil’s Lake State Park has hosted a The Ringling
Published By: Capital Newspapers
Brothers, of circus fame, owned a summer home, icehouse, and garage with chauffer quarters on the lake’s shore. Circus elephants bathed in Devil’s Lake. An 85-foot tall lookout tower was built on the west bluff. Ulysses S. Grant visited Devil’s Lake. There was a race between an “oarsman” and a hiker. A man won $5 in a greased pole climbing contest by putting sandpaper on his arms and legs. Abraham Lincoln’s wife toured the park. Devil’s Lake had its own Post Office and train station. In the depths of winter, gung-ho adventurers have chopped holes in the lake ice to go swimming. There was a vineyard and winery at the south shore. A round hand-hewn tree house hosted meetings of the “Old Settlers Association.” A bluff-top resort failed when the manager died of typhus, and frightened people avoided the area like, well, the plague.
Baraboo, WI General Manager: Matt Meyers
Tourism Publications: Andrew Nussbaum Advertising Director: Julie Brown Graphic Design: Nicholas Ahles Cover Photo by: M. Knapstein
Devil’s Lake has always been
a place that has easily given rise to grandiose stories and rumors, sometimes making it difficult to sort fact from fiction.
The first people at the lake
probably date back more than 10,000 years; clear evidence shows prehistoric people using the shelter at what is now Natural Bridge State Park
and at the Durst rock shelter soon after the last ice age. Both are within a day’s walk of Devil’s Lake. The first irrefutable evidence of people at the lake points to a fascinating enigma: the mound builders of about 1000 years ago. They left effigy, linear, and conical mounds behind. To this day, the speculation of historians is widely dispersed among several theories about their long lost culture. Historic era Native Americans frequented the lake, but did not inhabit the valley on a long term basis. In 1832, John De La Ronde was the first non-Native American known to visit the lake. In 1849, naturalist and scientist, Increase Lapham commented “a large body of broken fragments have accumulated along the edge of the water rendering it very difficult to walk along shore: yet two of our party made a circuit of the lake, jumping from rock to rock as best they could.” European immigrants and settlers took note of the lake in the mid-1800’s. With the routing of a rail line through the lake valley, tourism began booming.
The first of several hotels was
built in 1866, and the railroad was completed in 1873. Transportation and accommodation went hand-in- hand to provide adventurous visitors with a well-appointed glimpse into
“Curious History” Continued on Page 4
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