Bendigo State Park in Elk County, Pennsylvania, occupies a valley along the East Branch Clarion River, with only a small portion developed for day use and most of the land remaining wooded. Its name is linked by local tradition to the English prizefighter William Thompson, called Bendigo, though no records show he ever came to America; the name instead became attached to a nearby lumber-boom town. After that boom faded, Johnsonburg acquired the land in the 1920s for a community park. Works Progress Administration improvements during the Great Depression were mostly destroyed by 1940s flooding. The Commonwealth took over in 1949, and the park opened officially on August 15, 1959.