Most People Don't Know There's A Lost City Hiding In Indiana's Geist Reservoir
By Elizabeth Crozier|Published May 21, 2020
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Elizabeth Crozier
Author
An Illinois transplant who grew up and went to school in Indiana for 22 years, Elizabeth holds a BFA in creative writing and has enjoyed traveling across the country and parts of Europe. She has visited half of the states, as well as parts of Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean, and regularly travels home to the Hoosier State to see friends and family. With more than five years of writing experience, Elizabeth’s articles have been featured on several websites, and her poetry and short stories have been published in multiple literary journals.
The lost city of Germantown resides under the Geist Reservoir and would still be around today if it had not been flooded. Learn all about the history of this forgotten place. Check it out:
Locals know it as the present upscale part of northern Indianapolis where the million-dollar homes reside and the place where celebrities are going to have a home if it's in Indiana. Geist Reservoir has been part of an exclusive subdivision since the 1980s, but what lies beneath is one of the Hoosier State's first towns.
Germantown was established in 1834 and was a small town with a general store, a grist mill, and a shoemaker. It is known that modern-day Main Street in Indianapolis comes out of Germantown Road.
In 1941, the Indianapolis Water Company built a dam across Fall Creek in order to supply clean water to residents of the city. In doing so, it flooded 1,900 acres of Germantown including 45 homes.
It took a few years before the reservoir began supplying water to residents. The area became a source of summer fun with locals visiting in order to use boats and go fishing on the new lake.
It is rumored that when the water levels reach their lowest points, a church steeple can be seen poking out from the surface. Local lore says this is the final remains of Germantown but no church has ever been discovered below the water.
Further, no record of a church existing in this long-forgotten town can be found either. The likelihood of a church steeple poking out from the Geist Reservoir is improbable. Those who have reported it were probably fooled by a tree branch or some other sunken and abandoned item.
