Lake Okeechobee’s Five Counties

Lake Okeechobee (map) dominates South Florida’s landscape. It’s a massive liquid patch along a narrow peninsula. It’s as if some giant creature found the lower portion of the state a convenient coaster for the world’s largest mug. Additionally it is the second largest freshwater lake contained wholly within the United States. Only one of the Great Lakes — Lake Michigan is larger. Finally, it covers a whopping 730 square miles but averages a measly 9 feet deep.

Sunset at Lake Okeechobee. Photo by Katherine Bowman; (CC BY 2.0)
Lake Okeechobee

Actually, Lake Okeechobee is merely an opening within the surrounding Everglades. Thus it’s a clearing in a much larger body of water camouflaged by swamp and sawgrass. This would generally interest me enough to cover it on the website just for that one fact. However, there is an even more unusual feature that has nothing to do with nature. It has everything to do with the unique way mankind carves out its little territories.


Geographic Distinction

Lake Okeechobee 5 Counties

Look at this Lake Okeechobee map. Clearly it shows a place where five different Florida counties come together at a single point: Glades; Hendry; Palm Beach, Martin and Okeechobee. There is no other spot in the United States where this occurs. So it forms the nation’s sole county quintipoint.

It’s fairly common to find a boundary where four political units come together. Obviously, this happens anytime two lines cross. It is much more unusual to find more than four coming together. It often signals that something of particular importance sits at that common point. In this case it’s the lake itself. More specifically, it’s the large reservoir of fresh water that is useful both for drinking and for agriculture.


How it Happened

Lake Okeechobee in 1921

Neighboring counties didn’t always share Lake Okeechobee so equitably. The Palm Beach County government’s public affairs website [link no longer available] explains that the entire lake belonged to Palm Beach County until 1963. This prior ownership arrangement appears quite clearly in this detail from a 1921 L.L. Poates map available through the University of South Florida. Notice how the blue county boundary for Palm Beach marked by the red arrows wraps entirely around the lake.

As the population of South Florida and demands for fresh water grew, so did the demands of counties bordering on Lake Okeechobee. Eventually the State of Florida stepped in and divided ownership among the five. That is how the state ended up with five counties coming together at a common point.


Posted

in

, ,

by

Comments

6 responses to “Lake Okeechobee’s Five Counties”

  1. David P. Smith Avatar
    David P. Smith

    Can anyone tell me if there is any type of bouy or fixed marker at the five-county quintipoint in Lake Okeechobee, Florida?
    How accurately has this point ever been determined?

    1. Twelve Mile Circle Avatar

      Good question, David. One of the regulars who comments on this blog has been to that point. You can get contact information at the bottom of this post. Also I remember reading his original account about this feat (although my memory is getting a little fuzzy on the finer points). I don’t recall reading about a buoy but I remember being fascinated that he reached a spot in the lake where he could not see land in any direction! I’m pretty sure you should be able to get to the point fairly accurately with an hand-held GPS. The longitude/latitude is precise but it’s probably unmarked other than what you might see on your GPS. Best of luck and please let us know if you reach the spot. Also, please feel free to return if you would like to follow some more geo-oddities.

    2. Kyle Avatar
      Kyle

      Is there a company that will take you to the 12 mile point where the five Counties meet?

      1. Vinnie Joe Avatar
        Vinnie Joe

        No but I’ll gladly be willing to throw up a DBA and go out of Torry Island or Port Maycaya

  2. George William Brock Scott Avatar
    George William Brock Scott

    This point of the five counties meeting involves more than just water. In the early 1960s, my father William R. Scott in his term in the Florida legislature representing Martin County proposed, guided, and saw to completion the division of Lake Okeechobee because at that time (and perhaps still), highway funds were determined by the total area covered by the counties.

    By claiming all of Okeechobee, Palm Beach County’s share of highway funds was at a higher level than justified by the area of the county which could actually support a roadway. Martin was formerly a part of the larger county, and when it was pared from Palm Beach County the lake remained claimed by Palm Beach County until my father’s legislation.

    Upon confirmation of the new legal jurisdiction, representatives from Palm Beach County presented William Ralph Scott with a jug of water, representing all the water left to Palm Beach County by William Scott. This jug and its commemorative label and documentation now resides in the Martin County Historical Society Museum on Flagler Avenue in Stuart, Florida.

    I have tried to determine the best name for the point where the five counties meet. I could find no legal term for this point, so I called Math Professor David Anderson at the University of Tennessee, who suggested the geometric term “Vertex”. The proper name for this point is the “William Scott Vertex of Lake Okeechobee”. Future divisions of this sort can justifiably be called “Scott Vertices”.

  3. Fritz Keppler Avatar
    Fritz Keppler

    Curiously, MapQuest maps (as well as Bing and AAA, perhaps more) show another quintipoint in Chesapeake Bay, at the supposed meeting place of Northampton, Poquoson, York, Gloucester and Mathews counties/cities. I hope that this is a mapping error and that the borders have changed, since one quintipoint in the US is enough! Oddly, MapPoint shows this meeting of 5 units only at its Zoom Level 10 and higher, and shows the more traditional lines at Zoom Level 9. (Lower levels do not show county lines.) I wrote MapQuest asking about this discrepancy, but they were unable to account for it, and they have not returned subsequent queries. Very strange indeed. I have been finding numerous line discrepancies in the online mapping programs, so for my own records I go by DeLorme, since that is the type of GPS I use.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Latest Comments

  1. Clint, 24 March 2021. I’m 89 years old and have traveled the 100th Meridian for years between Uvalde, TX and…

  2. Many of these comments are very interesting, have enjoyed reading. We cross several times a year as well going from…