Lake Matoaka

Last updated
Paddleboarding and kayaking on Lake Matoaka, 2020. Lake Matoaka, 2020.jpg
Paddleboarding and kayaking on Lake Matoaka, 2020.

Lake Matoaka is a mill pond on the campus of the College of William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, located in the College Woods. Originally known both as Rich Neck Pond for the surrounding Rich Neck Plantation and Ludwell's Mill Pond for Philip Ludwell who owned it, Lake Matoaka was constructed around 1700 to power a gristmill. [1] [2] The pond was renamed after acquisition by the college to bear the Powhatan name for Pocahontas. [3] Construction projects by the Civilian Conservation Corps, college, and others have contributed to the lake becoming a site for outdoor entertainment and recreation.

Contents

Description

Lake Matoaka is located on the western edge of the College of William & Mary's campus in Williamsburg, a city in southeastern Tidewater Virginia. Bordering the eastern portion of the roughly 150 hectare College Woods, the body of water is roughly 0.17 km2 (0.066 sq mi) with a maximum depth of 4.8 m (16 ft). [4] [5] Water from the lake empties into College Creek. [2] The dam on the south side of the lake is traversed by Jamestown Road. [6]

The lake is heavily populated by fish and turtles despite poor water quality. [3] The "Near Side" is adjacent to developed campus and has in recent years been a prothonotary warbler breeding site. Also on the Near Side are the Keck Environmental Field Lab, the renovated original amphitheater, and the ruins of the second amphitheater. [7] A small boathouse operates from this side, with paths and bridges connecting the lakeside to campus near the William & Mary Police Department offices. [8]

The core samples from sediment in Lake Matoaka have been studied for the lakebed's capacity to retain historic atmospheric information. Among the discoveries were microscopic spheroidal carbonaceous particles left by fly ash from coal-fire furnaces in the Eighteenth Century during Williamsburg's industrial and political peak and lead particulates traced to production in 19th-century Galena, Illinois. [9]

History

While serving as deputy secretary of the Colony of Virginia, Philip Ludwell purchased the property of Rich Neck Plantation in Archer's Hope Swamp in Middle Plantation, now Williamsburg. [10] [11] In 1693, letters patent issued by King William III and Queen Mary II chartered the College of William & Mary in Virginia, establishing the boundary of the college property on the edge of Archer's Hope Swamp and the Rich Neck property. [12] Some time in the early 18th century, a gristmill and the mill pond to power it were constructed for Ludwell by damming College Creek. [2] [3] During this period, the mill pond was known as Rich Neck or Ludwell's Mill Pond. [1] The original mill is thought to have been destroyed in 1863, though a rebuilt mill may have operated through the 1920s. This later mill is reported to have burned in 1945. The location of some of the plantation's structures have been located by identifying concentrations of dispersed bricks. [11]

The College of William & Mary acquired the property containing the lake and much of the College Woods in the 1920s, renaming the former to Lake Matoaka after the Powhatan name for Pocahontas. [3] By 1933, this area was designated to become one of the few Virginia state parks and was inaugurated as Matoaka Park in October 1934. [13] [14] The still-preserved College Woods are now the largest contiguous forest in Williamsburg. [4]

The arrival of a Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) encampment in the fall of 1933 on the college's campus saw many new structures and trails built around Lake Matoaka. [12] : 25  While on the campus, the CCC men received educational support from the college. [15] The CCC constructed Cary Field, and in 1935 a boathouse on Lake Matoaka–this latter structure rapidly falling into disuse and decay by the 1950s. [16] [17] Additionally, the CCC also constructed more than 10 mi (16 km) of trails, many of which survive unimproved, [18] and bridle paths along the shore of the lake. [19] : 152  When heavy rains washed out the lake's spillway in 1937, CCC men rebuilt it. [12] : 25 

Recreation on Lake Matoaka previously permitted non-boating activities in the water, with winter sports recorded as including ice skating in 1940. [19] : 161  Following the sharp degradation of water quality in the 1980s due to multiple sewage spills and other factors, swimming in the lake was prohibited. The lake still rates as hypereutrophic with annual algal blooms, resulting in its continued closure to swimmers. [3] A portion of Lake Matoaka that extends higher into campus and is partially dammed by trails is known by the neologism "Grim Dell," a corruption of Crim Dell referencing the neck's extremely poor water quality. [20]

Amphitheaters

Matoaka Amphitheater located on the shore of Lake Matoaka, 2022 Matoaka Amphitheater.jpg
Matoaka Amphitheater located on the shore of Lake Matoaka, 2022

The Martha Wren Briggs Amphitheatre at Lake Matoaka is an amphitheater with space for up to 2,000 patrons. The amphitheater was built by the Jamestown Corporation in 1947 to host The Common Glory , a historical outdoor drama by Paul Green recounting the story of Williamsburg during the American Revolution which also lent its name for the amphitheater's original name. [21] The play would play through the summer from 1947 until 1976. [22] With the folding of the Jamestown Corporation, the amphitheater was acquired by the college in 1976 and renovated in 2006. [22]

A second amphitheater was constructed in 1956 to host another Jamestown Corporation play, The Founders, which told the story of the Jamestown Settlement. This second amphitheater, known as the Cove Amphitheater, could host 1,700 attendees. The play and the amphitheater closed after two years. The Cove Amphitheater is now rewilded and overgrown without restoration or maintenance, though its dressing room has survived as an art studio. [22]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Williamsburg, Virginia</span> Independent city in Virginia, United States

Williamsburg is an independent city in Virginia, United States. As of the 2020 census, it had a population of 15,425. Located on the Virginia Peninsula, Williamsburg is in the northern part of the Hampton Roads metropolitan area. It is bordered by James City County on the west and south and York County on the east.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">College of William & Mary</span> Public university in Virginia, US

The College of William & Mary in Virginia, is a public research university in Williamsburg, Virginia. Founded in 1693 under a royal charter issued by King William III and Queen Mary II, it is the second-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and the ninth-oldest in the English-speaking world. It is classified among "R2: Doctoral Universities – High Research Activity". In his 1985 book Public Ivies: A Guide to America's Best Public Undergraduate Colleges and Universities, Richard Moll included William & Mary as one of the original eight "Public Ivies". The university is also one of the original nine colonial colleges.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Middle Plantation (Virginia)</span> Unincorporated town established in 1632 that became Williamsburg, VA

Middle Plantation in the Virginia Colony was the unincorporated town established in 1632 that became Williamsburg in 1699. It was located on high ground about halfway across the Virginia Peninsula between the James River and York River. Middle Plantation represented the first major inland settlement for the colony. It was established by an Act of Assembly to provide a link between Jamestown and Chiskiack, a settlement located across the Peninsula on the York River.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bruton Parish Church</span> Historic church in Virginia, United States

Bruton Parish Church is located in the restored area of Colonial Williamsburg in Williamsburg, Virginia, United States. It was established in 1674 by the consolidation of two previous parishes in the Virginia Colony, and remains an active Episcopal parish. The building, constructed 1711–15, was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1970 as a well-preserved early example of colonial religious architecture.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">First Families of Virginia</span> Socially prominent families in colonial Virginia

First Families of Virginia were families in the British colony of Virginia who were socially prominent and wealthy, but not necessarily the earliest settlers. They descend from European colonists who primarily settled at Jamestown, Williamsburg, the Northern Neck and along the James River and other navigable waters in Virginia during the 17th century. These elite families generally married within their social class for many generations and, as a result, most surnames of First Families date to the colonial period.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Green Spring Plantation</span> 17th century plantation of the governor of Colonial Virginia in North America

Green Spring Plantation in James City County about five miles (8.0 km) west of Williamsburg, was the 17th century plantation of one of the most unpopular governors of Colonial Virginia in North America, Sir William Berkeley, and his wife, Frances Culpeper Berkeley.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Philip Ludwell</span> Colonial official, planter and soldier

Philip Cottington Ludwell was an English-born planter and politician in colonial Virginia who sat on the Virginia Governor's Council, the first of three generations of men with the same name to do so, and briefly served as speaker of the House of Burgesses. In addition to operating plantations in Virginia using enslaved labor, Ludwell also served as the first governor of the Carolinas, during the colony's transition from proprietary rule to royal colony.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">College Creek</span> Stream in Virginia, United States

College Creek is located in James City County in the Virginia Peninsula area of the Hampton Roads region of southeastern Virginia in the United States. From a point of origin near the independent city of Williamsburg, it is a tributary of the James River.

Queen's Creek is located in York County in the Virginia Peninsula area of the Hampton Roads region of southeastern Virginia in the United States. From a point of origin near the Waller Mill Reservoir in western York County, it flows northeasterly across the northern half of the Peninsula as a tributary of the York River.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Vernon Geddy</span> American lawyer

Vernon Meredith Geddy Sr. was an attorney based in Williamsburg, Virginia. He attended the College of William and Mary and the University of Virginia, and served W&M as the head coach for the William & Mary Tribe men's basketball team for the 1918–19 season.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">History of the College of William & Mary</span>

The history of the College of William & Mary can be traced back to a 1693 royal charter establishing "a perpetual College of Divinity, Philosophy, Languages, and the good arts and sciences" in the British Colony of Virginia. It fulfilled an early colonial vision dating back to 1618 to construct a university level program modeled after Cambridge and Oxford at Henricus. A plaque on the Wren Building, the college's first structure, ascribes the institution's origin to "the college proposed at Henrico." It was named for the reigning joint monarchs of Great Britain, King William III and Queen Mary II. The selection of the new college's location on high ground at the center ridge of the Virginia Peninsula at the tiny community of Middle Plantation is credited to its first President, Reverend Dr. James Blair, who was also the Commissary of the Bishop of London in Virginia. A few years later, the favorable location and resources of the new school helped Dr. Blair and a committee of 5 students influence the House of Burgesses and Governor Francis Nicholson to move the capital there from Jamestown. The following year, 1699, the town was renamed Williamsburg.

Rich Neck Plantation was located in James City County, Virginia in the Colony of Virginia.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Burwell family of Virginia</span>

The Burwells were among the First Families of Virginia in the Colony of Virginia. John Quincy Adams once described the Burwells as typical Virginia aristocrats of their period: forthright, bland, somewhat imperious and politically simplistic by Adams' standards. In 1713, so many Burwells had intermarried with the Virginia political elite that Governor Spotswood complained that " the greater part of the present Council are related to the Family of Burwells...there will be no less than seven so near related that they will go off the Bench whenever a Cause of the Burwells come to be tried."

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Philip Ludwell III</span> Politician, translator, and first convert to Eastern Orthodoxy in the New World


Philip Cottington Ludwell III was a Virginia planter, soldier and politician who twice represented Jamestown in the House of Burgesses, and like his father and grandfather of the same name also served on the Virginia Governor's Council. Like his grandfather decades earlier, he left his plantations in the care of overseers in 1760 and permanently moved to London, England. In 1738, Ludwell had become the earliest known convert to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in North America, and would translate several religious works from Greek into English.

The Common Glory was an outdoor symphonic drama by Paul Green presented along Lake Matoaka on the campus of the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, from 1947 to 1976, except for two years. The drama covered a span from the Jamestown colony's early days to 1782, when the United States of America was established after the colonies gained independence from Great Britain.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Saint Bede Catholic Church (Williamsburg, Virginia)</span> Catholic parish and national shrine

Saint Bede Catholic Church in James City County and Williamsburg, Virginia, is a Catholic parish in the Diocese of Richmond. The National Shrine of Our Lady of Walsingham, located adjacent to the campus of the College of William & Mary, is a part of the parish. It was the first Catholic church in Williamsburg.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">President's House (College of William & Mary)</span> Residence of the President of the College of William & Mary

The President's House is the residence of the President of the College of William and Mary in Virginia in Williamsburg, Virginia. Constructed in 1732, the building still serves its original purpose and is among the oldest buildings in Virginia. Since its construction only one of the college's presidents, Robert Saunders Jr., has not moved into the building, which is let for free to the president. The President's House is William & Mary's third-oldest building and the oldest official college presidential residence in the United States.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Philip Ludwell Jr.</span> Virginia burgess

Philip Ludwell Jr. was a Virginia planter and politician who served several terms in the Virginia House of Burgesses, and became an important figure in the colony's new capital at Williamsburg as well as with the newly established College of William & Mary. As had his father Philip Ludwell, and as would son Philip Ludwell III, this man served on the Virginia Governor's Council and operated plantations using enslaved labor.

Sir Richard Kemp was a planter and politician in the Colony of Virginia. Kemp served as the Colony's Secretary and on the Governor's Council from 1634 to 1649. As the council's senior member, he also served as the acting Colonial Governor of Virginia from 1644 to 1645 during travels by Governor Sir William Berkeley. Kemp had also worked closely relation with Berkeley's predecessor, Sir John Harvey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Campus of the College of William & Mary</span>

The College of William & Mary has maintained a campus in what is now Williamsburg, Virginia, since 1693. The cornerstone of the Wren Building, then known as the College Building and the oldest surviving academic building in the United States, was laid in 1695. The college's 18th-century campus includes the College Building, the President's House, and Brafferton–all of which were constructed using slave labor. These buildings were altered and damaged during the succeeding centuries before receiving significant restorations by the Colonial Williamsburg program during the 1920s and 1930s.

References

  1. 1 2 Rouse, Parke (16 August 1992). "Mills Once Dotted Williamsburg Area". Daily Press . Williamsburg, VA. Archived from the original on 9 February 2022. Retrieved 9 February 2022.
  2. 1 2 3 "Lake Matoaka once a meeting place". Daily Press . Williamsburg, VA. 19 May 1991. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 10 February 2022.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 "Lake Matoaka". Williamsburg, VA: The College of William & Mary in Virginia. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 10 February 2022.
  4. 1 2 "Facts about Lake Matoaka". Williamsburg, VA: The College of William & Mary in Virginia. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 15 February 2022.
  5. ↑ Balascio, Nicholas L.; Kaste, James M.; Meyer, Meredith G.; Renshaw, Madison; Chambers, Randolph M. (March 2019). "A high-resolution mill pond record from eastern Virginia (USA) reveals the impact of past landscape changes and regional pollution history". Anthropocene. 25. Future Earth: 100190. Bibcode:2019Anthr..2500190B. doi:10.1016/j.ancene.2019.100190. S2CID   134310256. Archived from the original on 9 February 2022. Retrieved 8 February 2022– via ScienceDirect.
  6. ↑ "Jamestown Road". Williamsburg, VA: Department of Historic Researches, Commonwealth of Virginia. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 10 February 2022– via The Historical Marker Database.
  7. ↑ Anthony, Matt (15 February 2018). "Matoaka Lake & Woods". Birding Virginia. Archived from the original on 9 February 2022. Retrieved 9 February 2022.
  8. ↑ Peng, Carol (7 November 2013). "Follow the Bridge to Sparkling Lake Matoaka". The Flat Hat . Williamsburg, VA. Archived from the original on 14 February 2022. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  9. ↑ McClain, Joseph (2 July 2019). "Decoding Lake Matoaka's sedimental history of the anthropocene". Williamsburg-Yorktown Daily. Williamsburg, VA. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 9 February 2022.
  10. ↑ McCartney, Martha W. (2000). Land Ownership Patterns and Early Development in Middle Plantation: Report of Archival Research. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library Research Report Series. Williamsburg, VA: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library. p. 18. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 10 February 2022.
  11. 1 2 Muraca, David (2009). Archaeological Testing at Rich Neck. Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library Research Report Series. Williamsburg, VA: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library. Archived from the original on 12 February 2022.
  12. 1 2 3 McCartney, Martha W.; Kiddle, Christina A. (1996). Williamsburg Cultural Resources Map Project City of Williamsburg. Williamsburg, VA: Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Library. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 10 February 2022.
  13. ↑ Wirth, Conrad L. (January 1944). "Civilian Conservation Corps Program of the United States Department of the Interior: March 1933 to June 30, 1943". Service Learning, General. United States Department of the Interior: 31 – via University of Nebraska Omaha.
  14. ↑ "Crim Dell, Dedicated 1966". Williamsburg, VA: Special Collections Research Center, William & Mary Libraries. Archived from the original on 13 February 2022. Retrieved 13 February 2022.
  15. ↑ Carvalho, Joseph (1977). "Race, Relief and Politics: The Civilian Conservation Corps in Virginia, 1933–1942". Williamsburg, VA: The College of William & Mary in Virginia. Archived from the original on 12 February 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  16. ↑ "Civilian Conservation Corps, New Deal Project: Virginia Still Enjoys Projects Today" (PDF). National Park Service. Archived from the original (PDF) on 12 February 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  17. ↑ Dickon, Chris (2007). The College of William and Mary. The Campus History Series. Charleston, SC: Arcadia Publishing. p. 55. ISBN   9780738543796 . Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  18. ↑ "Matoaka Trails". Williamsburg, VA: The College of William & Mary in Virginia. Archived from the original on 10 February 2022. Retrieved 12 February 2022.
  19. 1 2 Kale, Wilford (2016) [1985]. Hark Upon the Gale: An Illustrated History of the College of William and Mary in Virginia. Williamsburg, VA: Botetourt Press.
  20. ↑ "Grim Dell". 21st-Century Interdisciplinary Dictionary. 19 April 2016. Archived from the original on 14 February 2022. Retrieved 14 February 2022.
  21. ↑ "'Common Glory' To Be Given On July 17th". Daily Press . Newport News, VA. 25 May 1947. p. 20. Archived from the original on 15 February 2022. Retrieved 14 February 2022– via Newspapers.com. Open Access logo PLoS transparent.svg
  22. 1 2 3 Hogan, Claire (11 March 2019). "Stranger Places: Cove Amphitheater". The Flat Hat . Williamsburg, VA. Archived from the original on 14 February 2022. Retrieved 14 February 2022.

37°15′58″N76°43′24″W / 37.26611°N 76.72333°W / 37.26611; -76.72333

This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.