Many scuba divers know about it, but did you know that resting under 100-150’ of water in Lake Travis, there are the remains of an old plant that was helped to shape the lake as it is today? This plant, the Shaker Plant, was built in the 1930’s to help with construction of Mansfield Dam. The Shaker Plant served to separate rocks into different sizes to be transported to the dam via trams for concrete and is one of today's favorite scuba diving destinations on Lake Travis.
If you saw the lake when it was down in 2009, you probably remember the chain of islands (called Sometimes Islands by locals) that are to the northeast of the dam, where the Colorado River snakes towards The Oasis Restaurant around before reaching the dam. The Shaker Plant sits on the northern side of those islands at about 600’ elevations.
Thanks to Tiffany Young of the Community Impact Newspaper for bringing this interesting tidbit of Lake Travis history to our attention, and to "diveandconquerprod" for the YouTube video! If you are interested in finding out more about the history of the chain of lakes known as the Highland Lakes visit LCRA.org, but if you want to know more about Austin or Lake Travis area real estate, just give me a call at (512) 507-5779 or shoot me an email at shelleyr@remax.net.
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