This area for miles around was the ancestral home of the Wukchumne Yokuts until 1852, when Tulare County was established. Settlers came soon after to establish farms and cattle ranches along the north side of the Kaweah River. Floods in the 1860s caused them to move to higher ground around what is now Woodlake. In 1872 the Wutchumna Ditch was dug to bring water through the area and a small reservoir called Bravo Lake was formed. Early in the twentieth century, Gilbert Stevenson of Southern California envisioned a town near a much larger lake with tourist accommodations. In 1910 the Visalia Electric Railroad was run through Stevenson's new town. By 1912 a block-square two-story brick commercial building was built, and streets, sidewalks, sewer and water lines were being installed, commercial and residential lots being sold, and the lake greatly enlarged. Gilbert Stevenson's money ran out, but the town he fathered continued to flourish. In 1941 Woodlake became an incorporated city and is still a growing center of trade for farms, citrus, and cattle ranches.