White Lake Property Owners Association
History, Maps & Photos
Our Mission: The White Lake Property Owners
Association is dedicated to preserving and
protecting the quality and enjoyment
of White Lake for all current and future stakeholders.
My family (Elfners) has owned property on White Lake since 1954, twelve years before I was born. My knowledge of the history of White Lake is through family stories and what I have overheard at the Lake Association picnic over the past 30 year or so. I will put down what I can think of on this page, but I welcome corrections, contributions and photos from those who know better. Please e-mail them to the address below. - Eric Elfner
White Lake Photos - If your family has any photos of the lake from past or present that you would like to contribute, please send them to whitelakepoa (at) gmail.com.
Water Levels - The lake is at a very low point today (2007.) Many residents remember the very high levels in the 1980s, but may not have been around for the low levels of the 1960s. I located some old family photos that show the water level very low in 1970, very high in 1985 and very low again in 2006. The stairs in each photo are at the same spot.
50 Years of Lake Data - This is a scan of Stan Young's data collection of water levels from 1986 - 2007. It also contains information on Ice Out going back to 1955 - 2007 and when the lake froze over from 1987 - 2007.
Scharenbergs - The resort that has been operating for over 80 years on the east end of the lake. My understanding is that it started out in the 1920s and 1930s as a hunting and fishing camp, and evolved over the years into a family resort.
The Point/The Duck Blind - White Lake is unique in that it narrows in the middle with two points. The north one is considerably larger as it has been reinforced (long ago) with granite blocks from the nearby Montello Quarry. When I was young, there was a metal box at the tip that was, according to Eliot Elfner (my father), a duck blind for hunters. As the lake rose in the 1980s, it covered the entire point, but you could see pieces of the duck blind under water (and the granite blocks were a constant threat to lower units of boats that ventured too close.) Over Thanksgiving weekend, 2006, my daughter and I took a walk around the lake and walked out to the point. There we found all that was left of the duck blind.
Buck's Point - The south point that narrows the lake across from the duck blind, is known as "Buck's Point" because it was the site of Buck's Resort. Actually called Al Buck's Cottages in the Pines, it operated until the mid-1960s, and then the cottages were sold to individual property owners. In August 2007 scuba divers recovered a rowboat in about 20 feet of water that allegedly dates back to the days of Buck's resort. Click on the links above for some history and pictures of the resort and rowboat.
1985 WLPOA Map - Tom Kielich found this map from September 1985. It was evidently hand-drawn by Adam Pientka and had a border with all the residents' names by cottage number. I cropped that out for the website to thwart any telemarketers, but it was fun to see the names that are still here, and the ones I remembered from the past. I will share it with property owners upon request.
1939 WPA Survey of White Lake - Part of a Works Progress Administration Survey of Lakes. One of my colleagues, Kern Dodds, found it on the DNR's website and pointed it out to me. This map shows considerable greater depths (up to 70 feet) than I've ever seen with my depthfinder. I published this map in the November 2006 newsletter and received this 11/20/06 e-mail message from Curt Cedarleaf:
"My first introduction to this map was in 1965, as I found it in the DNR office in Madison while searching the WPA's involvement in the placement of "minnow spawning logs" represented by the *** on the map in the shallow areas. The depths were recorded during the summer using a weighted rope with knots placed every 2 feet and a double knot every 5 feet. The notes I saw said the two man crew used a row boat and located the spot of sampling using triangulation. A mention was made of noting a solid or soft bottom but I didn't find anything recorded.
"The DNR employee I was talking with concluded that the measurements were most likely accurate to the limit of the method used. The reason for the difference in depth between 1937 and today is most likely from run off of sand and silt and the accumulation of organic matter from weed die off. The lake bottom is very low in oxygen, except at fall and spring turnover, which if present in higher levels will help degrade the organic matter into gases and exit through the water column to the atmosphere."
Contact webmaster at whitelakepoa (at) gmail.com. (You'll have to be a little smarter than the spam web-bots and reformat our address into a proper e-mail address. Thanks!)
Last Updated by Eric Elfner August 2008 (What's New?)
