ENGAGE SUNDAY – BENEATH THE OAKS – GREEN LAKE BEFORE THE SETTLERS

Presented by Tom Eddy. Long before the Green Lake area became a hub of towns and farmland, the land was alive with open, sun-dappled oak savannas. Around 1830, early surveyors crisscrossed the area, recording the lay of the land, and their notes give us a rare window into this vanished world. They describe vast stretches of oak woodlands, with sunlight spilling onto grassy openings where wildflowers and prairie grasses thrived. Historical accounts from people who actually saw it confirm the picture: a landscape that felt open and airy, with scattered oaks standing like sentinels over rolling meadows. It was a place shaped by nature’s quiet rhythms—before plows, roads, and towns transformed it forever.