The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1897-06-19
LAKE MICHIGAN RISING
MYSTERIOUS INCREASE OF WATER
IN THE GREAT INLAND SEA.
Expected to Be Six Feet Higher than
Last Year Before the Inflow Ceases
Various Theories.

CHICAGO, June 18--The Times-Herald
says: Lake Michigan is rising, and no
man can say whence the water comes.
Steadily and surely the great inland
sea is increasing her depth. Before
the new inflow ceases at least six feet will
be added to the level that existed a year
ago. Drainage channel engineers have
noted the change that is going on. The
water gauge man sees it daily, ahd Lyman
E. Cooley, consulting engineer for the lbig
ditch, knows it to be true. But no man can
tell why or how the phenomenon comes. .
Long, long ago, men who studied the
lake and it's peculiarities, found out that
her waters rise and fall. Every seven
years or so there is a change. For seven
years the volume falls steadily. Then for
similar period it rises The flood time is
new going on. 1t has just begun. The last
ebb started in 1886. and was extraordinarily
long, lasting practically eleven years, four
more than is usual Lyman E. Cooley is
authority for all this He is backed by
mariners, government officials and all
others who have dealings with the great
unsalted sea. From every harbor on the
lake complaints have been made for eleven
years. Mariners saw the waters receding
from the short line. The depths became
shadows. Boats that could traverse some
parts Of the lake, prior to 1886, found in
sufficient draught. Pessimsts said the lake
was drying up. Scientists were silent, but
remembered that this ebb and flow was
governed by periods.
Explanations were numerous, but none
was believed to have attained the true So
luton of the mystery In 1893 Prof. Henry
A. HaZen, of the Weather Bureau, noted
THE level of Lake Michigan has reached a
stage little GIG fooD below the lowest
average stage known, that of 1S47, and I'M
der the influence Of a sontherly wind it has
recently gone two feet below the, 1S47
stage" Later than that the lake fell still
lower. Last fall fishermen on the north
shore noticed that the lake line was adj
vancing. Stretches of sandy beach that
had been high and dry for years were dis
appearing. Subsequently the engineers be-
ban to observe this fact and noted it again
this spring. To them it was only the indi-
cation that the drought period had come to
end and that the lake level was moving
upward, and, judged by the past, would
probably continue to do so for seven years
to come.
singular effect noticed at the ebb time
last year was that Lake Superior had the
highest stage of water known in its his
igan then no one rises to explain A the
DRY has long existed that the Red river
valley, the Dakotas and eastern Montana
are above great subterranean lake, and
that this lake has close underground con-
nection with the great lakes. The Indians
gave currency to this theory long before
Scientists considered it seriously. The In
dams and biologists said that when the
waters of this underground lake were low
there was drought in the Dakotas and high
water in the great lakes. When the waters
were high there was drought in the lakes
They made the periods of drought and flood
about six years each.
All the same, Lake Michigan is slowly
rising. That her level will ever go back
to the old sea mark of past years is i'm
possible. The water level rose in 1879 and
began to fall in 1886. Engineers say that
there has been a permanent diminution of
the lake level of some six inches in twenty
four years. or about one-fourth of an inch
per year There seems to be a gradual dim
mutton of the water level of the lake of
from one-fourth to one-third of an inch a
year, while the water supply of Chicago
draws out nearly one-ffteenth of a cubic
mile each year.