Levee Levee A levee (), dike, dyke, embankment, floodbank or stopbank is an elongated naturally occurring ridge or artificially constructed fill or wall, which regulates water levels. It is usually earthen and often parallel to the course of a river in its floodplain or along low-lying coastlines. Speakers of American English (notably in the Midwest and Deep South), use the word "levee", from the French word "levée" (from the feminine past participle of the French verb "lever", "to raise"). It originated in New Orleans a few years after the city's founding in 1718 and was later adopted by English speakers. The
Pecks Lake Pecks Lake Pecks Lake is a small reservoir, fed by water from the adjacent Verde River, near Clarkdale in the U.S. state of Arizona. The name of the nearby Tuzigoot National Monument comes from an Apache word, "Tuzigoot", meaning "crooked water". The "crooked water" reference is to Pecks Lake, established in a cutoff meander of the river. The shallow lake gets most of its water from the river through a tunnel on the northwest corner of the property, downstream from a large slag heap from the former copper smelter at Clarkdale. Overflow from the lake passes over a weir at