CCC Company 2896 Enrollees
Between 1935 and 1942, an estimated 3,000 youths, mostly from communities in North Texas, were members of Civilian Conservation Corps Company 2896 at White Rock Lake Park, constructing concession buildings and "rip-rap" retaining walls, planting trees, helping dredge the lake, and making all sorts of improvements that are still enjoyed by park visitors in the 21st century.

For The Love Of The Lake (FLTOTL)
Working in cooperation with the Dallas Park and Recreation Department, this grass-roots citizens activist organization, founded in 1995, has made innumerable improvements to the park, including benches, trashcans, playground equipment, and so on. Their "Second Saturday Shoreline Spruce-Up," a monthly ongoing activity, helps keep both park and lake clean and free of litter and floating debris. FTLOTL has also taken an interest in the park's history. In recent years the group funded the CCC statue at Sunset Bay, two Texas Historical Commission markers (not yet erected), and was a major sponsor of the White Rock Lake Museum.

Kurt Kretsinger
Initiated the founding of the White Rock Lake Museum and worked hard to make it a reality.

Joe E. Lawther
Mayor of Dallas (1917-1919). During his adminstration fishing became the first legally sanctioned recreational activity at White Rock Lake and a road that was later named in his honor was build around the lake. In 1937 the lake's first dredge boat was also named for Lawther. In later life, as an influential private citizen, he championed park improvements, including the tearing down of unsightly fishing shacks that had been built around the lake shore.

John McCutcheon
Popular folk-singer whose FTLOTL-sponsored concerts raised money for park improvements and the CCC statue at Sunset Bay. John has written and recorded two songs about White Rock Lake: "Walks on Water" (about the ghostly Lady of the Lake), and "The Boys in Green," which praises the CCC enrollees who made park improvements during the 1930s and '40s.

Marci Novak
(Seen here with former FTLOTL President Maria Richards. That's Marci on the right)
Tireless founder of For The Love Of The Lake. 'Nuff said!

Kathy Mays Smith
Initiated the placement of a statue at Sunset Bay that salutes the CCC.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt
Popular Democratic President who, as one of his first acts upon taking office in 1933, initiated the founding the Civilian Conservation Corps, a public works program that benefited millions of unemployed young men during the Great Depression. In 1935 a CCC camp opened at White Rock Lake Park. FDR never had the opportunity to visit the Dallas camp but the estimated 3,000 enrollees who passed through it during the seven years of its existence made improvements that are still being enjoyed by park visitors to this very day.

J. Waddy Tate
Populist "Hot Dog" Mayor of Dallas (1929-1931) who championed recreational facilities at the lake that would appeal to the common folk. During his administration the Bath House and Bathing Beach and the Municipal Boathouse were built, along with picnic tables and similar improvements.

Johnny Williams
Johnny Williams was the well-known owner of a motorboat concession at White Rock Lake during the the park's "Golden Era." He was also "Captain" of the Bonnie Barge - named for his wife, a floating dance hall that could be seen on the waters of White Rock Lake from 1946 to 1958.