Lake Havasu, the centerpoint of Lake Havasu City, was formed in 1938 after the Parker Dam, shown above, was built. It created 60 continuous miles of lake and river waterways.

Parker Dam is a concrete arch-gravity dam that crosses the Colorado River 155 miles downstream of Hoover Dam. Built between 1934 and 1938 by the Bureau of Reclamation, it is 320 feet high, 235 feet of which are below the riverbed, making it the deepest dam in the world.

The dam's primary functions are to create a reservoir, and to generate hydroelectric power. The reservoir behind the dam is called Lake Havasu and can store 647,000 acre feet or over 210 billion of US gallons of water. The dam straddles the state border at the narrows the river passes through between the Whipple Mountains of California and the Buckskin Mountains of Arizona. Lake Havasu backs up behind the dam for 45 miles and covers more than 20,400 acres (32 square miles). The Metropolitan Water District`s W. P. Whitsett Intake Pumping Plant for the Colorado River Aqueduct is located on the shore of Lake Havasu about two miles upstream from the dam. The aqueduct begins at the intake pumping plant and extends 242 miles to its terminus at Lake Mathews near Riverside, California.

About half of the power generated at Parker Dam is reserved by MWD to pump Colorado River water along the Colorado River Aqueduct. The remaining power is marketed to users in California, Nevada and Arizona by the Western Area Power Administration. By contract, the use of active storage in Lake Havasu to generate power is limited to the elevation between 440 to 450 feet.