Lake named by John Brek who surveyed the township lines in about 1835 - because it reminded him of Seneca Lake near Geneva, N.Y.

From Increase Lapham's 1844 Geographical and Topographical Description of Wisconsin:

"GENEVA LAKE, eight miles long, and a little more than one mile average breadth, covering an area of 5,423 acres, or nearly eight and a half square miles; and having a periphery of nineteen miles. It was formerly called Big Foot lake, from some fancied resemblance of its form to that of the human foot. Is is supplied mostly from springs, not having any considerable tributary. It is principally in township one, range seventeen, and its longest diameter lies nearly due east and west. Fontana is at the head of this lake, and Geneva is at the foot."

View a related article at Wisconsin Magazine of History Archives.

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[Source: Simmons Annals, p. 11.]