Great Lakes Mesoscale convective complexs or MCCs can cause damage to wide swaths of forest and shatter glass in city buildings. These storms mainly occur during the night, and the systems sometimes have small embedded tornadoes, but more often straight-line winds accompanied by intense lightning. Historically, the Great Lakes, in addition to their lake ecology, were surrounded by various forest ecoregions (except in a relatively small area of southeast Lake Michigan where savanna or prairie occasionally intruded). Logging, urbanization, and agriculture uses have changed that relationship. In the early 21st century, Lake Superior's shores are 91% forested, Lake Huron 68%, Lake Ontario
Great Lakes Theater who credits the Great Lakes Theater Festival for beginning his acting career. Great Lakes Theater was formerly known as Great Lakes Theater Festival, which continues to be its legal name. "Festival" was dropped from the classic theater company’s business name to better reflect its September through May season, and programming format. Arthur Lithgow started what was going to be Great Lakes in the 1950s at Antioch College, in Yellow Springs, Ohio. During the few years in Antioch, all of Shakespeare's plays were performed. The company traveled for performances at Stan Hywet Hall in Akron, the Toledo Zoo, and Cuyahoga Falls.