It took an act of Congress to create what we now know as like Cumberland, the man made lake dates back to the Flood Control Act of 1938 and later the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1946.

As our Laura Rogers explains, today is Mecca for recreation and tourism took a great deal of planning that began nearly a century ago.

Back in the 20s, in the 30s.

The first thoughts were to build a dam across Wolf Creek.

Construction of that dam would happen on the Cumberland River and Russell County starting around the time of World War two.

You have all sorts of architects, engineers, real estate officers.

There's a ton of planning that's going into the development of the project before any shovel hits the ground.

Wolf Creek Dam was completed in the early 1950s, and that created this reservoir, and we refer to it as Lake Cumberland.

The creation of the lake did come with the loss of some small towns in the bottom lands.

There is no way to not acknowledge the communities that were inundated by these impounded waters.

One of those submerged communities, called Burnside still exists today on higher ground, and they have a wonderful opportunity thriving community.

That economic impact spans across southeastern Kentucky.

The tourism industry is great.

USA today is named Lake Cumberland among the ten best lakes in the country.

The secret out.

So it's no longer a hidden gem per se.

To be fair, it's hard to stay hidden when you have 1255 miles of shoreline, which is longer than the shoreline of the state of Florida and a capacity of more than 6 million acre feet of water.

There's approximately 30 million in Olympic sized swimming pools in this reservoir.

That's a lot of water.

And in 2007, signs of a seepage led the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to do an emergency drawdown, which led to another discovery.

We did find lots of artifacts during the drawdown and the locations, and the identification of those artifacts is not released to the public for that specific reason to preserve it for the greater study and the greater knowledge of protecting our past, a past that has made way for a fruitful future ripe with recreational opportunity and investment.

The lake is home to ten marinas.

Boaters can tie up and have a great dinner, sunset dinner, watching the sunset across the lake.

It's a really neat experience.

The Corps of Engineers also collaborates with Kentucky State Parks, the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife, and City and County Tourism Commissions, who used grant funding to put navigational signage on the lake.

These signs help our visitors communicate where they are on a lake that's 101 miles long and in some cases from shoreline to shoreline, is a mile across.

It all adds up to a uniquely Kentucky experience.

Appreciating our natural resources and the place we call home at Lake Cumberland, you can go and find your own private little cove.

It's completely wooded, surrounded by birdsong, and have the whole area to yourself.

And it truly is a little getaway for Kentucky Edition.

I'm Laura Rogers.

Thank you so much, Laura.

Light Cumberland is also a popular fishing spot, and the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife has included the lake in its fish habitat improvement Project.

The Corps of Engineers says it's a good example of collaboration between state and federal agencies.

We'll have much more from the region all week long as Kentucky Edition goes on the road.