South Carolina created the public utility now known as Santee Cooper in 1934 with authority to build two major reservoirs, Lake Marion and Lake Moultrie, divert water from the Santee River toward the Cooper River and construct a hydroelectric plant at Pinopolis. The project became the largest New Deal program in the state.
Construction accelerated after 1939. Santee Cooper records that more than 12,500 workers cleared swamps and woodlands, built dams and dikes, and constructed the powerhouse and navigation lock. In 1941 President Franklin D. Roosevelt designated the Pinopolis Power Plant a national-defense project as the United States entered World War II.
On February 17, 1942, the project generated electricity for the first time at what is now Jefferies Hydroelectric Station. Its first customer was a defense contractor producing ferrochromium used to harden steel for ships and tanks. The Pinopolis navigation lock, dropping roughly 75 feet from Lake Moultrie to the Tailrace Canal, was the world’s highest single-lift lock when built.
The engineering project also created one of America’s most influential freshwater fisheries. SCDNR’s Lake Moultrie history documents the development of the Santee Cooper striped-bass fishery and later blue and flathead catfish fisheries. Today Moultrie remains working power-and-navigation infrastructure, a major recreation lake and a place where fishing history and South Carolina industrial history are tightly connected.