A little casual research leaves me with the impression that the -> exact <- origin of the name "Devil’s Lake" for this body of water remains uncertain, and is likely to remain so. If anyone has further information beyond that outlined below, please do contribute it. A few writers have looked into this matter in the past, and here is my contribution to the speculation, based on their books and a quick internet search.

It seems to me altogether possible that three factors present in the minds of numerous mid-19th century American settlers and visitors to this lake interacted to cause the name to be firmly established as "Devil’s Lake" by the early 1860’s.

FACTOR NUMBER ONE: American Indian names for the lake translated roughly to English as "Sacred Lake," "Holy Lake," "Spirit Lake," etc. and were open to mistranslation by the early settlers and visitors as "Devil’s Lake." As Kenneth Lange and Ralph Tuttle write in their book "A Lake Where Spirits Live: A human history of the Midwest’s most popular park," 1975, 3rd edition 1993, page 6:

"Why is it named �Devil’s Lake?’ We believe that this is a white man’s name and that it is a misnomer."

Another source by a reputable author is "The Wisconsin: River of a Thousand Isles" by August Derleth, 1985, Univ of Wisconsin Press, paperback edition. In this book Derleth also comments on the possibility of mistranslation playing a role. On pages 153-154 of this book, Derleth writes:

"James S. Alban of Prairie de Sac saw the lake in 1839 … it was perhaps he who called it Lake of the Hills, before the Indian name, Minnewaukan, or Evil Spirit Lake, was known."

Derleth later on the same page of that book also writes as follows:"John T. de LaRonde saw it in 1842 and wrote: ‘I went and saw the Devil’s Lake, which is a little south of the village of Baraboo.’"

Thus, by 1842 at least some people were referring to the lake by the name "Devil’s Lake." (This book is one of many on sale at the Wisconsin State Historical Society’s latest site: The H. Bennett studio in downtown Wisconsin Dells.)

FACTOR NUMBER TWO: The name "Devil’s Lake" was more interesting and had better commercial benefits to railroads, hotel owners and lake tour operators than alternative names being suggested by others at the time. Kenneth Lange and Ralph Tuttle again on page 6 of their book write concerning some of the "Indian" legends:

"We suspect that some of these [Indian legend] stories originated in the publicity of this area by the railroad company, and others in the fanciful but alluring accounts written by certain newspaper correspondents. An 1872 account, for example is subtitled, ‘The best description yet…A splendid mass of adjectives.’ Also revealing is a comment by a correspondent in the Milwaukee Sentinel for 16 April 1868: ‘A good many legends about the lake have been set afloat on the sea of literature; and I don’t know but I have as good a right to start one as anybody else.’ Commodore Brown, a pilot of one of the early touring boats on the lake, contributed to the storehouse of imaginative stories."

And they conclude this section of their book by the following on page 7:

"The entire story may have been expressed best by the Green County Republican [newspaper] for 24 September 1872: ‘Had the lake been christened by any other name, it would not have attracted so many people…Had it been called "Paradise Pond" fewer would have cared to visit it.’"

FACTOR NUMBER THREE: A widespread inclination by 19th century Americans to name dangerous or simply odd natural features by using the word "Devil" as a part of the name. This inclination was probably shared by mid-19th century settlers who came to south central Wisconsin. I haven’t read anything about -> why <- they had this tendency, but it was certainly present in their minds.

This inclination is described in his book "Names on the Land" by George R. Stewart, 1945/1958/1967. While the quote below from Stewart was written to describe the naming of places on the Great Plains and Rocky Mountains that accompanied the rapid settlement of these areas after the Civil War, it probably applied to naming of places in the old northwest territories (now called the "Midwest" of course) in the two decades prior to the Civil War as well. The tongue in cheek quote below is from page 316 of the paperback edition published by Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston:

"The Devil’s western holdings became varied and numerous. . . . When he [the 19th century American] wished to give any idea of the supernatural, he resorted to the Devil. If the Sioux ‘wacan’ indicated that a body of water was spirit-haunted, the American usually translated it as Devil’s Lake. When he saw a mass of columnar basalt so gigantic as to suggest more than human power, it became The Devil’s Post pile. More often, the idea of the torture of hell was involved, half-humorously. A dike of hard rock projecting from a mountainside often presented a regular curve suggesting a gigantic slide. But its jagged top also suggested an extremely painful process. So it became The Devil’s Slide . . . Such names had been fairly common in the East, but the more spectacular western scenery suggested them more frequently. Probably every mountain state has at least one Devil’s Canyon. The usage survived into recent enough times to provide the Devil’s Golf Course. Hell was often used with much the same ideas as Devil. With the aid of alliteration, any bad stretch of trail or river became Hell’s Half-Mile, and any particularly desolate area was Hell’s Half-Acre."

The lake today named "Devil’s Lake" is strikingly beautiful, but it must have been more strikingly beautiful, even hauntingly so, to mid-19th century visitors. First of all, the talus slopes would have descended down into the water not only on the west side as now, but also on the east side (i.e. prior to the construction of the railroad tracks) and on the south side (i.e. prior to the construction of the road). (When one stops to think about it, these constructions were in effect vandalism on a huge scale). Secondly, these could easily have been the first talus slopes visitors had ever seen, even in pictures. (This is probably true for some visitors today as well). Mid-19th century Americans would not have had access to color photographs/magazines/movies/television/internet information, or first-hand experience for that matter, of wild beautiful landscapes from all over the world as we do today. And thirdly, they would not have had the scientific understanding of the creation of land forms that we do today. One can only imagine them climbing up to get a look at the Devil’s Doorway formation or the Balanced Rock, or the potholes, and wondering what kind of Force (with a capital "F") could have done this. (Looking at them even today leaves one kind of wondering!). If they were supernaturally inclined, the name "Devil’s Lake" must have readily suggested itself to more than one 1840’s and early 1850’s visitor.

Incidentally, another example of a nearby natural feature named using "Devil" is given in "A County Called Sauk" by Kenneth Lange, 1976, 2nd Edition 1998 published by Worzalla Publishing Company for the Sauk County Historical Society in Baraboo. In this book on page 19 there appears the following sentence:

"Most of the rafting lore for this region centers around the Dells, with its rapids and treacherous Devil’s Elbow, which is a sharp and constricted bend in the river."

And another famous example of using the word "Devil" in naming an unusual rocky place is the name given at the time�and now forever�to a plot of land at the southern end of the battlefield at Gettysburg: Devil’s Den.

Some idea of the widespread use of "Devil" in naming things can be obtain by using an internet search engine. One quickly finds that there are "Devil’s Lake’s" in many states. If one then restricts the internet search to just the state of Wisconsin, it turns out that according to the USGS site, there are no fewer than nine (9) lakes in Wisconsin named "Devils Lake"! They are in the counties of Bayfield, Burnett, Fond du Lac, Forest, Marinette, Sauk, Sawyer, Vilas and Washburn. And if one further includes lakes named with "Devils Lake" as a part of the name (Big Devils Lake in Washburn county, and Upper and Lower Devils Lakes in Barron county), there are three more for a total of twelve (12) lakes named this way just in Wisconsin alone! Clearly, "Devil’s Lake" was a name for lakes that came readily and naturally to 19th century Americans.

My speculation is that the three factors outlined above probably worked together in the minds of numerous individual mid-19th century settlers and visitors to result in the lake being firmly and finally known as "Devil’s Lake" by the time of the end of the Civil War.

And this was true despite some opposition to the name by those who believed the name to be inappropriate. Kenneth Lange and Ralph Tuttle point out that the name "Devil’s Lake" won out even though local newspapers preferred and actually deliberately suggested and publicized alternative names. On pages 6 and 7 of their book, they write:

"… in an editorial in 1858 this newspaper [the Baraboo Republic] stated its preference for the name �Spirit Lake.’ They believed it to be a correct translation of its Indian name, and they didn’t like the connotations associated with a name like �Devil’s Lake’. The Kilbourn Mirror suggested �Wild Beauty Lake’ in the same year. At least one other name was proposed: in the Milwaukee Sentinel for 5 September 1871, a correspondent expressed ‘a desire to expunge the dissonant appellation of Devil’s Lake from every map, and call that sheet Junita Lake instead’."

But the name "Devil’s Lake" was firmly embedded, and has remained the official name ever since.

Yet the controversy must continue in the minds of some. The most recent, perhaps wistful, vote against the current official name was cast by someone who worked on repairing the trails during the summer of 1999. There about half way up the CCC trail you will find his/her vote for the preferred name written in the then fresh concrete: "Spirit Lake."

One other minor grammatical point about the name that I have never seen mentioned in print: The name has historically, and continues to be at present, spelled in two different ways, namely both with and without an apostrophe between the "L" and the "S." This difference appeared at least once even on the same map (see the third page in the front of Lange and Tuttles’ book). Technically there is a subtle difference of course. With the apostrophe, it is singular possessive (one devil�his lake); without the apostrophe, it is simply plural (lots of devils�and they don’t own the place). Signage in the area of the state park is actually inconsistent on this point, oddly enough. The wooden dark stain with indented white lettering signs (made by park personnel?) employ the apostrophe, while the metal white on brown or green directional signs (made by county personnel?) omit the apostrophe. I guess whomever made the signs just decided on his/her own which it was to be. Kenneth Lange and Ralph Tuttle (who are clearly the most authoritative writers on the history of Devil’s Lake) seem to prefer the spelling with the apostrophe. And the park VISITOR newsprint handout that is given to current visitors also uses the apostrophe. By way of contrast, an example of an official publication not using the apostrophe is the pamphlet Kenneth Lange co-authored with John Attig, Lee Clayton and Louis Maher entitled "The Ice Age Geology of Devils Lake State Park" published by the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey, 1990. But, what’s an apostrophe among friends, huh? (My apologies to English teachers).

While I didn’t go out of my way to look for sources, when I happened to see other published speculation on the origin of the name "Devil’s Lake" I marked it, but none seemed to me to have the historical authority of the writings of Lange and Tuttle, Derleth and of Stewart, quoted above, especially when other sources omitted all footnotes. Not wishing to perpetuate odd-ball and probably incorrect notions, such sources are not mentioned here, except to note one that struck me as the oddest example of these kinds of offhanded explanations for the name. The source was�of all places–in a book of county road maps entitled "Wisconsin County Maps: Guide to Fun in Wisconsin , 1979, by the Clarkson Map Company in Kaukauna Wisconsin. In this, the write-up for Sauk county includes the following on page 93:

". . . Between the two ridges a basin was created and this filled up with water to make a lake so deep it probably disturbed the devil and the lake was named after him. Located three miles south of Baraboo, this park has swimming, boating, fishing, camp and picnic facilities." <= No footnote nor, for that matter, the name of the author provided.

The bottom line is that there seem to be some goofy things in print about this, which probably can be ignored other than for their quaint charm.

But even the most precise research such as that by Lange and Tuttle seems to leave an irreducible core of vagueness. Possibly a future historian will look into this specific topic, read through all available primary sources and come up with more definite information on this topic. But I doubt it. In any event, for the moment, I think the three main factors outlined above probably are about as close as most of us shall get to the origins of the name for this lake. And in a way, that’s OK. The lake is mysteriously beautiful, and how 1.6 billion year old (give or take a hundred million years) rock rose up to form bluffs we can see and touch today is mysterious. And so if the name is also somewhat mysterious, it fits perfectly.

Incidentally, if a person is interested in any of the history of Devil’s Lake and surrounding area, be sure to stop at the Nature Center house just off the north end entrance road, and go down to the lower level. There you will find on display on the walls dozens perhaps hundreds of fascinating old photographs, some of which bear on the name of the lake. For example, there is a photograph of a page of a tract written by Increase A. Lapham in 1849 entitled Geological Notes of Tour to the Dells, on which he refers to the lake by the name "Lake of the Hills."

Finally, we modern 21st century Americans continue to use the word "devil" in referring to things other than lakes once you stop to think about it: Had any "deviled" eggs recently, or a slice of "devil’s"-food cake?

- Contributed by Bill S. 11/2000

Editor’s Note: A reading of "Ancient Rocks and Vanished Glaciers" by retired Park Naturalist, Ken Lange., will suggest some other names given to the lake by the native residents at different times in history including "Mystery Lake" and "Lake of the Red Mountain Shadows".

Further Reading: Lange, Kenneth L. 1989. Ancient Rocks And Vanished Glaciers: Worzalla Publishing Company, Stevens Point, Wisconsin.