[2] Capitol Beach Lake is located roughly three miles west of Downtown Lincoln and is surrounded by permanent residences as well as summer homes and rental properties.

[2] Summertime activities at the lake include swimming, boating, sailing, fishing, water-skiing, and jet skiing.

[3]Approaching Lincoln from the east, the first remarkable object that meets the eye of the stranger is a succession of what appears to be several beautiful lakes extending along the lines of Salt Creek to the northward and westward of the town, the nearest a mile distant.

As their crystal surfaces glisten like molten silver in the sunlight the illusion is complete, and the most critical landscape painter would be deceived as to their character.

.These apparent lakes are the Salt Basins of Lancaster County, in themselves natural curiosities well worthy of a long journey to visit them.

[3]As we viewed the land upon which now stands this great busy city, we had the exciting pleasure of seeing for the first time a large drove of beautiful antelope, cantering across the prairie about where the government square is (9th and O streets).

W. Cox, 1888, describing the Lincoln landscape of July 1861[3]The area which would later be known as Capitol Beach Lake was the largest of these salt basins and the confluence of several streams.

V. Hayden, First Annual Report of the United States Geological Survey of the Territories, Embracing Nebraska, 1867[3]Prior to being chosen as the site of the Nebraska State Capitol, the area immediately surrounding the Salt Lake was populated only by the small village of Lancaster, which had a total population of thirty individuals.

[3] The salinity of Salt Creek is caused by ancient shale from the Cretaceous period, when the area was covered by ocean.

By 1906, the original owners had sold the park due to dwindling visitors caused by a leak in the dike which had depleted the lake of its water.

This lake, surrounded by trees and walks and drives, as it would be, and with ample park space on all sides is undoubtedly the city's greatest potential natural asset.—Lincoln State Journal, August 2, 1915Until 1958, Capitol Beach operated as a privately owned amusement park, featuring a saltwater pool and dance hall.

[3] In a process that also resulted in the destruction of a majority of Lincoln's natural saline wetlands, Salt Lake was drained in 1958 so that Interstate 80 could pass through it.

[3] In the 1990s, the Lower Platte South Natural Resources District began restoring elements of the saline wetlands which had previously dominated the area.