Pensacola Dam

Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2003.

From the record

“The Pensacola Dam, also known as the Grand River Dam, is a multiple-arch buttress dam located between the towns of Disney and Langley on the Grand River in Mayes County, Oklahoma. The dam is operated by the Grand River Dam Authority and creates Grand Lake o' the Cherokees.”
Wikipedia article Pensacola Dam, CC BY-SA 4.0.

One of 6 National Register listings published here for Mayes County · listed in 2003 · category: District.

Sources: the Wikipedia article · the case file at the National Archives · the National Register database, National Park Service

The listing

Address. OK 28 over Grand R, 0.5 mi. E of jct. with OK 82, Langley, 74350
When was it listed? September 2003
Category. district
Census division. East Mayes
Architect. John Duncan Forsyth
National Register reference number. 03000883 - the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.

Fires near this property

77 since 1992

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal wildfire occurrence database lists 77 fires within 5 miles of Pensacola Dam between 1992 and 2018, burning about 2,173 acres in total. 2 started naturally. 36 were recorded as arson. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Reported cause	Fires
Arson/incendiarism	36
Missing data/not specified/undetermined	25
Debris and open burning	8
Equipment and vehicle use	4
Natural	2
Recreation and ceremony	1
Smoking	1

The most recent of them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service that recorded it.

Date	Cause	Size	Reported by	Name on the report
7 September 1999	Arson/incendiarism	under an acre	Cherokee Nation Tribe	HWY 20
6 September 2000	Equipment and vehicle use	20 acres	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	not named
22 September 2017	Debris and open burning	1.0 acres	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	not named
6 August 2011	Arson/incendiarism	under an acre	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	30415
6 August 2011	Arson/incendiarism	1.0 acres	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	30414
2 August 2006	Equipment and vehicle use	8.0 acres	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	30540
10 August 2006	Arson/incendiarism	2.0 acres	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	30569
8 July 2012	Arson/incendiarism	under an acre	Oklahoma Division of Forestry	30273B

Every fire recorded in Mayes County

Mines and quarries near this property

6 within 5 miles

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists 6 workings within 5 miles of Pensacola Dam: 6 past producers. None of them still produces. What was taken out: Sand and Gravel, Construction, Stone, Crushed/Broken. Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.

Site	Commodity	Status
Unknown Limestone Pit	Stone, Crushed/Broken	Past Producer
Unknown Sand Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown Sand Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown Sand Pit	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown Sand Pits	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer
Unknown Sand Pits	Sand and Gravel, Construction	Past Producer

Every working recorded in Mayes County

Storms near this property

17 since 1995

Regional context, not property-specific evidence. The National Weather Service names Langley, the town this property stands in, in 17 storm reports between 1995 and 2023: 8 thunderstorm wind, 5 hail, 2 flood, 1 flash flood. No death or injury is recorded in these reports. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date opens the federal record of that event.

When	Event	Place named	Harm	What the report says
March 2020	Hail	Langley	$150,000	Large hail damaged vehicles, and the roofs of homes and businesses.
September 2023	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	$15,000	Strong thunderstorm wind damaged a restaurant, snapped large tree limbs, and blew down power lines.
May 1999	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	$4,000	Windows were blown out of a brick house, a large old tree was uprooted, and a pontoon boat was tossed from its trailer.
May 2019	Tornado (EF0)	Langley	$3,000	This tornado snapped large tree limbs and blew down a few power poles. Based on this damage, maximum estimated wind in the tornado was 75 to 80 mph.
May 2012	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	$2,000	Strong thunderstorm wind damaged the shingles of several homes and blew down large tree limbs.
July 2004	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	$2,000	Thunderstorm winds estimated at 70 miles an hour blew trees down onto power lines.
September 2015	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	-	Strong thunderstorm wind snapped large tree limbs.
December 2015	Flood	Langley	-	Portions of Highway 82 were closed between Langley and Spavinaw due to flooding.
April 2013	Flood	Langley	-	Several roadways and low water crossings were reported flooded.
July 2010	Flash Flood	Langley	-	Heavy rains resulted in water covering rural roads between Spavinaw and Langley.
June 2007	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	-	Thunderstorm winds estimated at 60 miles an hour blew down several large tree limbs.
March 2007	Hail	Langley	-	no account filed
April 2006	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	-	no account filed
April 2006	Hail	Langley	-	no account filed
February 2001	Hail	Langley	-	no account filed
March 1996	Hail	Langley	-	no account filed
June 1995	Thunderstorm Wind	Langley	-	no account filed

Every storm recorded in Mayes County

Map coverage status

No historic map-sheet match is published for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary. Browse the county's mapped places while that work is pending.

Listed places nearby

1 within 8 miles

Other National Register properties close enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties to their map sheets.

Photograph	Property	Distance	Listed
	Cabin Creek Battlefield	4.9 miles	1971

Sources for this property

National Archives record	The nomination case file for reference 03000883 in Record Group 79.
Wikipedia article	Community-written account of this property, licensed CC BY-SA.
Mayes County	All 6 listed properties in this county.

Provenance

Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.