The Crawford Knoll Site located on the eastern branch of the St. Clair River delta uncovered bone and projectile points dating back to 1500 to 1000 BCE which suggest seasonal usage by the local Indigenous population.
Toponymy First Nations/
Native Americans used the lake as part of their extensive navigation of the Great Lakes. The
Mississauga called it '
, meaning "(at) the whirlpool". The Wea derived their name from a Miami cognate: '. In the latter part of the 17th century, the Mississauga established a village near the lake. Early French mapmakers had identified the lake by a variety of French and Iroquoian-language names, including ''
[Seawater Lake]; Lac Ganatchio
("kettle," for its shape), in French . A variety of Native names were associated with sweetness, as the lake was freshwater as opposed to saltwater. These included Otsiketa
(sugar or candy), Kandequio
or Kandekio
(possibly candy), Oiatinatchiketo
(probably a form of Otsiketa), and Oiatinonchikebo''. Similarly, the Iroquois nations called present-day
Lake Huron a term meaning "The Grand Lake of the Sweet Sea" (fresh water as opposed to salt water.) The French expressed this association on their maps as '
(sweet sea) and the Dutch identified it in Latin as '. On August 12, 1679, the French explorer
René Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle arrived with an expedition. He named the body of water
Lac Sainte-Claire, as the expedition sighted it on the
feast day of
Saint Clare of Assisi. The historian on the voyage,
Louis Hennepin, recorded that the
Iroquoian tribes referred to the lake as
Otseketa. As early as 1710, the English adopted the French name, identifying the lake on their maps as Saint Clare. By the
Mitchell Map in 1755, the spelling appeared as the shorter "St. Clair," the form that became most widely used. Some scholars credit the name as honoring the
American Revolutionary War General
Arthur St. Clair, later Governor of the
Northwest Territory, but the name Lake St. Clair was in use with this current spelling long before St. Clair became a notable figure. Together the place name and general's name likely influenced settlers' naming a proliferation of nearby political jurisdictions: the Michigan county and township of St. Clair, as well as the cities of
St. Clair and
St. Clair Shores. Some local historians attributed the namesake to
Patrick Sinclair, a British officer who purchased land on the
St. Clair River at the outlet of the
Pine River. There, in 1764, he built Fort Sinclair, which was in use for nearly twenty years before being abandoned. Unlike most smaller lakes in the region—but like the Great Lakes—
Lake comes at the front of its proper name, rather than the end; this is reflective of its French origins. ==Geography==