Grapevine Lake

In March of two thousand ten, a man named Kris Howe picked up four bones at Grapevine Lake. They came from a bird that lived ninety-six million years ago. Two Dallas scientists said it was the oldest bird ever found in America. The lake itself is barely seventy years old. The Army Corps of Engineers dammed Denton Creek and started filling the reservoir on the third of July, nineteen fifty-two. To make room, the Corps bought about fifteen thousand seven hundred acres of land and put easements on twenty-two hundred more, all of it to go underwater. The job was flood control first, drinking water second. Recreation came a distant third. Grapevine, Dallas, and the Park Cities all hold rights to the water. The bird bones had been sitting there the whole time, waiting out the dinosaurs, the creek, and the concrete.