A Brief History of the Mahone Bay Islands...
Many years ago, 15,000 to 10,000 BCE, a kilometre-thick sheet of ice covered this area. The inner islands of Mahone Bay are glacial drumlins deposited by the melt waters of that period.
In 8,000 BCE the first native peoples arrived, followed by the Mi'kmaq. They established many summer camps along the shoreline and at the river mouths. Since 1,000 A.D. a number of islands have been lostdue to erosion and rising sea levels.
The French arrived in the 1600s and called the area 'La Baie des Toutes Isles'.
In the 1750s, other European settlers arrived and found Mahone Bay an ideal area for farming, fishing, logging and ship building. Many of these families settled the larger islands.
Almost every Mahone Bay island has a sand beach, and local residents have been using them for hundreds of years as landing places for foraging, hunting, fishing, logging and recreation. The islands were also a haven for privateers and rum runners during Prohibition. In addition, there are many stories about ghost ships and buried treasure.
To discover more, follow these links:
Coastal trade and Wrecks