Old Lake Dam

Duane's take

Here's how the official marker tells it, and I'll pass it along just as it reads. Now, in Ellis County, there's a dam, and behind it, a body of water that's gone by so many names, you'd think it was tryin' to stay anonymous. City Reservoir.

Ennis Railroad Lake. Old City Lake. Take your pick.

But whatever you call it, the story of how it got there is worth pullin' over for. The year was 1891, and the Houston and Texas Central Railroad had made a proposal: the kind of proposal a town couldn't afford to turn down. Move the railroad's divisional headquarters to Ennis.

Move it from Corsicana. All Ennis had to do was make it worth their while. So they built a dam.

Constructed in 1891, that dam held back enough water to serve the train station and the machine shops that came with a divisional headquarters. And the railroad came. Now, once that railroad put down roots here, Ennis started to grow; the marker says it plainly: the location of the railroad contributed to the growth of the city.

One dam. One deal. One lot of water.

And a town that was never quite the same after. These days, the Old Lake Dam isn't just a relic of some nineteenth-century railroad negotiation. It provides recreational facilities and flood control for the area.

The lake that watered the locomotives is still out there, still working. Some things in Texas, they just refuse to stop bein' useful.

What the marker says

Constructed in 1891, this dam created a body of water known variously as the City Reservoir, Ennis Railroad Lake, and Old City Lake. It was built in answer to a proposal by the Houston and Texas Central Railroad to move its divisional headquarters to Ennis from Corsicana. The lake provided water for the train station and machine shops. The location of the railroad here contributed to the growth of the city, and in recent years the Old Lake Dam has provided recreational facilities and flood control for the area.