Lake Pontchartrain

In Images of America: Lake Pontchartrain, photographs document memories of a time that not even Hurricane Katrina could erase.

Native Americans used Okwata, meaning "wide water," as a shortcut for inland trade between the Gulf of Mexico and the Mississippi River. When the Europeans arrived, the original inhabitants showed them the route--the settlement near the river became the city of New Orleans, other lakeshore communities grew, and Lake Pontchartrain continued to be a vital waterway well...