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Riddles Lake · Pleasant Lake
Round, kettle-shaped survivors of the wet ground — measured by the state, gauged by the USGS, and thinner in the record than they look. Howard, citing the state geologist's 1900 report, already described the county's lakes as "small in size, and most of them rapidly becoming extinct", and named this township's pair in one breath: "Pleasant lake and Riddle's lake, in Union township, south of Lakeville." Both lie in T35N on the state's public-lakes list — Pleasant Lake a half-mile south of Lakeville, Riddles Lake three miles southeast — and a quarter-mile channel connects them; the pair are described together in the fishery record as natural lakes, "somewhat round or kettle-shaped". That magazine description is the only explicit kettle-form statement found — no geological-survey or DNR document stating a kettle origin for either lake individually was reached, and the file prints the shape, not an upgraded origin. Riddles Lake: 77 acres on the DNR's 2019 bathymetric map; legal water level 817.5 feet above mean sea level on the DNR's levels list; gauged by the USGS (station 05515800) for 56 years, October 1945 to September 2002, before discontinuation; its maximum depth is not established — the map's extracted text carries acreage and contours but no depth figure, and none is invented here. Pleasant Lake: 29 acres and a maximum depth of 29 feet on the DNR's bathymetric survey of 19 June 2008 — a steep-sided basin for its size — against a fishing carrier's 27 acres, the conflict printed whole with the surveyed figure governing; gauged by the USGS (04099190) from 1945 to 1966; no legal level for it was found on the DNR list reached. Both lakes are listed for high phosphorus in the Headwaters Yellow River watershed plan — the fact that fixes their drainage, next article. Howard's possessive "Riddle's lake", with Henry Riddle and John Riddle carried in the works among the township's early settlers — their coming dated 1837, on Section 2 — supports a settler-family name; no source states the naming outright, and the lakes' name-beliefs are carried in the folklore file at exactly that strength.