Wakonda State Park near La Grange in northeastern Missouri covers 1,054 acres in a rare Mississippi River sand prairie landscape shaped by Ice Age sand and gravel deposits. Beginning in 1924, the Missouri Highway Commission had private companies remove those materials for road surfacing, using open-pit mining because the gravel lay deep underground; the excavations later became the park’s six small lakes. Established in 1960 on 273 acres transferred from the commission and later expanded, including a 777-acre addition in 1992, the park combines an industrial past with recreation through fishing, swimming, boating, camping, hiking, and bicycling. Its Osage name means something consecrated or spiritual.