Nebraskaland

November 2021 • Nebraskaland 61 burst early in June." Historical documents also tell of the CCC constructing numerous dams along Soldier Creek. Although not specifi ed, the Wood Reserve Ponds, near the fort's old timber and sawmill operation, and Crazy Horse Pond, named for the highly revered Sioux war leader who was killed while being detained at Fort Robinson in 1877, were likely among them. In 1936, Engelhardt wrote that station personnel graded bottoms and banks of two "Grable Spring trout nursery ponds." With corps labor, they also rebuilt the "lower ice pond dam and completed the spillway with concrete fl oor and side walls at discharge end of the spillway, riprapped upper ice pond spillway and rebuilt Grable Spring pond number three dam." Sometime since Engelhardt's reports, the spelling of Grable changed to Grabel in documents. Also, the "ice ponds" became known as Ice House Ponds and Grable Reservoir became Lake Crawford. The Old Ponds Records indicate the Ice House Ponds and Lake Crawford are the earliest of the fort's impoundments. Lake Crawford, which was originally called Grable Lake, is named for an enterprising family from the late 1800s that became known nationwide for its eff orts to develop the West. Regrettably, those eff orts seemed to end in scandal. The Crawford Tribune of the 1890s featured many headlines conveying excitement about Francis C. Grable and his nephew Charles J. Grable and their work in developing irrigation infrastructure in the White River Valley and gold mining and smelting operations in nearby Edgemont, S.D. Grable Lake was part of those eff orts. Francis C. Grable, an Ohio native, had connections to the railroad and had early dibs on townsites between Alliance and Deadwood, South Dakota. He also had connections to wealthy aristocrats on the East Coast and brought them to the West by train for tours, convincing them to buy stock in the operations. The two promoters were founders of the State Bank of Crawford, Francis fi rst serving as vice president and later president, and Charles as cashier. Newspaper accounts of the "Grable boom" tell of the men as charismatic characters who were working hard to bring prosperity to the region. "[Francis] Grable brought into existence more mining, smelting, manufacturing and like projects it has been estimated, than any other one man in the world," wrote an Omaha World-Herald reporter. "He fl oated all these schemes on money obtained from eastern capitalists." The whole operation crashed February 1898 when the cashier at the Chemical National Bank of New York The Grabel Ponds, recently renovated with fi shing access and habitat improvements, were an important part of the hatchery's operation. JUSTIN HAAG, NEBRASKALAND

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