White Oak Lake State Park

White Oak Lake is two lakes, built in 1961 by the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission with the state parks division: a 1,031-acre upper lake south of Highway 387 and a 1,735-acre lower lake north of it. The land came to the federal government in the 1930s under the Bankhead-Jones Farm Tenant Act, which was meant to help tenant farmers become owners, and the state acquired it in 1957 for recreation and conservation. The commission leased a shoreline strip on the lower lake in November 1964, and the park opened on April 1, 1967. Act 192 made it an official state park in 1969.

The woods give the park its character. Along its three trails the forest shifts from bottomland hardwoods to loblolly pine, and in places white sand shows on the forest floor, left from the time when the Gulf of Mexico covered much of the southern United States, retreating sometime between forty and sixty million years ago. The lake holds bass, crappie, catfish and bream, and herons, egrets, ospreys and bald eagles use it.

The state parks page lists 45 campsites, a marina with rental fishing boats and canoes, a pavilion, a playground and bicycles to rent at the visitor center. The center has an interactive video exhibit and information on the Red River Campaign, and it holds the interpretive display for Poison Spring Battleground State Park, eight miles away. Summer programs run through the season.