History
The lake was constructed as a source of water for Decatur, especially the local corn refining industry. Corn refiner A.E. Staley led the campaign to persuade Decatur to borrow the $2.0 million necessary for the project. Staley was not being altruistic; the manufacture of corn syrup and high-fructose corn syrup, which Staley's successor firm Tate & Lyle, and its local competitor Archer Daniels Midland, carry on to this day, is a water-intensive industrial process. Lake Decatur water is also used in the process of refining corn into ethanol. As of 2007, about 76 percent of Lake Decatur's water was used for commercial and industrial purposes.
As the largest artificial lake in Illinois at the time of construction, with a 30-mile (48 km) shoreline, Lake Decatur quickly became a focus of local recreation. The invention of the gasoline-powered speedboat had made sheltered reservoir waters attractive to many inland Americans.
Read more about this topic: Lake Decatur
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