Town Lake or Lady Bird Lake? Do you know how Austin's lakes got their names?

Newcomers to Austin, not knowing the deep history that bonds this city to the late President Lyndon Baines Johnson and his wife, Lady Bird Johnson, ask why the body of water that bisects the central city is named Lady Bird Lake.

This week's Austin Answered subject: How were Austin's lakes named?

I've written on this subject before, but it's good to update the story. Most major lakes in the Austin area came about because of dams that impounded the Colorado River. No, not the river that runs from the western Rocky Mountains through southwestern U.S. states and the Grand Canyon to Mexico, but rather the Texas river that rises near the border with New Mexico and flows southeasterly to the Gulf of Mexico.

The first dam on our Colorado was completed in 1893. It was constructed of large granite blocks that impounded Lake McDonald. A 1900 storm washed away the Austin Dam and a subsequent attempt to rebuild it came to naught. In 1938, Tom Miller Dam, named for an Austin mayor, replaced the old structure, and thus was born Lake Austin.

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Meanwhile, upstream, a series of Hill Country lakes were constructed, mostly with federal money, which provided electricity, water, recreation and flood control. In descending order, they are Lake Buchanan (1938), Inks Lake (1938), Lake LBJ (1951), Lake Marble Falls (1951) and Lake Travis (1941).

A final lake was not finished until 1960 and provided water to cool the controversial Holly Street Power Plant, since demolished. In 1959, its temporary name, "town lake," was first rendered formally as "Town Lake" in this newspaper. Some longtime Austinites take pride in still calling it by its first name.

During her final years, city leaders expressed a desire to rename it after Lady Bird, who, among many philanthropic projects, led the public charge to create a landscaped trail around Town Lake.

She demurred. As soon as she died, however, on July 11, 2007, Austin honored her — and pleased almost everyone else — by calling it Lady Bird Lake.

Send your questions about Central Texas past and present to "Austin Answered" at mbarnes@statesman.

This article originally appeared on Austin American-Statesman: Town Lake or Lady Bird Lake? Here's how Austin's lakes got their names