Lake Winona

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Lake Winona History

Little Rock Municipal Water Works originally developed Lake Winona as its first municipally-owned raw water supply. In search of a more reliable and higher-quality water source for greater Little Rock-North Little Rock, the city of Little Rock (in 1935) applied for a loan and grant from the Works Progress Administration. This was one of the various governmental agencies established during the Great Depression to make possible the development of a water supply and eliminate the metropolitan area’s dependence on the Arkansas River.

In 1936, the City sold $6.59 million in 4 percent, 40-year, non-callable bonds. The bonds were purchased for $3.85 million from the Arkansaw Water Company-the existing plant and distribution system on the south side of the Arkansas River. Construction started on a dam, on the Alum Fork of the Saline River. Plans for the comprehensive supply project included the dam and lake (later named Lake Winona); a 39 inch diameter, 35 mile, raw water line; a new purification plant at Ozark Point, (the original site of the community water purification system); and an auxiliary reservoir three miles west of the plant. Burns & McDonnell Engineering Company of Kansas City, Missouri, was the consulting engineer on the project.

Little Rock Municipal Water Works began construction in July 1936, and completed the project in May 1938. The first water from the new supply flowed into the system on February 17, 1938.

The water utility delivers supply, by gravity, from Lake Winona to the Ozark Point Water Treatment Plant. It is then conveyed to the Jack H. Wilson Water Treatment Plant, thus to a significant part of the water utility’s service area. Set within the forested slopes of the Ouachita National Forest and supplied by rainfall, Lake Winona provides a high-quality, soft, and pure water.