North Lake, WI

North Lake is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in the Town of Merton, Waukesha County, along Wisconsin Highway 83. Its name describes the setting, but the village grew through transportation and water power: mills stood on the Oconomowoc River, the Milwaukee and Superior Railroad reached North Lake in 1899, and a grain elevator turned the community into a shipping point for area farmers. A Chicago and North Western depot followed in 1910, serving a gravel quarry north of town and the ice harvest on North Lake itself.

The old crossroads still has institutions that give the community a recognizable center. North Lake School traces its roots to 1846, and the Town Hall Library operates from a former 1870s town hall renovated in the 1960s and expanded in 2009. The library works with youth groups, the volunteer fire department, artists, musicians, and neighborhood businesses. Around it, Merton's lake country supports hiking, biking, water activities, and summer events. North Lake's present map is a small core inside a larger Waukesha lake-and-subdivision landscape, with Highway 83 doing the connecting.