Beeds Lake State Park in north-central Iowa developed from a nineteenth-century mill site on Springbrook Creek into a public recreation area centered on a man-made lake. After a sawmill, flour mill, and mill pond operated there for decades, the old works were abandoned in the early twentieth century. Local advocates then pushed for a larger lake and public park, and in 1934 the land was acquired for the state and developed by Civilian Conservation Corps crews. Between 1934 and 1938 they built the dam, spillway, causeway, bathhouse, beach, footbridge, fish-rearing ponds, roads, and walkways that still define the park. Its significance lies in both recreation and its well-preserved Depression-era design.