Isle au Haut History

Note: This is not intended to represent a complete history of Isle au Haut. There is much that is not known or has been lost. What follows is a look into the past of the island; gaps are large and many.

Isle au Haut was created, along with the other islands and ledges in the Gulf of Maine, by the advance of glaciers carving out deep valleys in the terrain. When the glaciers receded and the ocean filled the valleys, the ridges that remained above sea level became islands.

Little is known about the first people to visit Isle au Haut. There are indications that their first visits to the island took place as long ago as several thousand years. They held great feasts, and the evidence of their visits remains in the large mounds of shells they left behind. It is widely believed that they were native americans of what we now know as the Penobscot tribe, although, strictly speaking, this may not be entirely accurate. I include here some correspondence I recently received that sheds some light on the matter. The following was sent to me by David Hughes; I thank him for his efforts in researching this issue.

"...found a reference to the shell heaps. They were created by an apparently unknown indian tribe. Very few artifacts were found in them, thus making it difficult to identify who put them there. They call them Oyster shell people.

"By the time of the Oyster shell people, life had developed a rather peaceful rhythm for Maine's natives. They summered in relatively large colonies on the coast and sometimes on the islands. When cold weather arrived, they dispersed....inland. That seasonal way of life was carried on by the Oyster shell people's successors, The Abenakis, or 'people of the dawn'."

It goes on to say,

"The Abenakis, a branch of the Algonquin nation were divided into four distinct tribes: the Androscoggins, the Kennebecs, the Penobscots and the Passamaquoddies."

Reference cited:
The Coast of Maine Book-A Complete Guide
Rick Ackerman & Kathryn Buxton
1992, Berkshire House, Box 297, Stockbridge, MA 01262

These shell mounds, now reduced to small fragments, are present at several locations on the island, most notably at Old Cove. Native Americans continued to visit the island until as recently as the 1920s or 1930s.

Probably the first white Europeans to see the islands of Penobscot Bay were with Verrazano in the 16th century. His explorations were followed by those of Samuel de Champlain. It was Champlain who in 1604 gave the island its name (High Island), and the highest peak on the island is named for him. The French did not settle here and little evidence of their influence remains, although there is a location on Isle au Haut known as The Seal Trap which on early maps is labeled Ciel Trap, "ciel" being French for "sky".

The first permanent white settlers on the island were English and Scottish, and came to the island in the late 1700s.

In 1792 Peletiah and Henry Barter were given a grant of land on the island by the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The Barters were soon followed by other families who brought with them names like Rich, Turner, Kimball, Robinson and Sawyer. Some of these families are still on the island today.

In 1802 a Scotsman named Robert Douglas settled on the eastern side of the island at what is now called Rich's Cove, which explains why early maps have this as Douglas Cove. In 1844, he sold his property to his son in law, one John Rich, and the Rich family occupied that part of the island until 1973, when Ava Rich passed away. Ava Rich was survived by her sister Elizabeth, who lived on the island until 1988.

To the west of Isle au Haut lies Kimball Island, which was very nearly connected to Isle au Haut until the channel between them was dredged in the early 1900s. In 1772, a crown grant was awarded to a man named Seth Webb for this island, and the story is told that Mr. Webb was killed when his musket exploded upon his first landing there. Ownership of Kimball Island reverted to his widow, but she was unable to hold it and it was eventually taken over by the well-to-do Kimball family.

By 1800, Isle au Haut boasted a population of about 50. Five of these settlers are known to have been deep-water shipmasters, the remainder were engaged in various occupations. It is fairly safe to assume that among these were the raising of sheep, some farming, and fishing. Fishing was not yet established as viable way of making a full-time living in this area, but it is likely that island dwellers fished for their own subsistence.

In 1801, Peletiah Barter and other Isle au Haut residents successfully petitioned the state of Massachusetts for ownership of the lands they had settled. One of the problems they wished to address was that while they were considered a part of the mainland community and as such were required to pay the attendant taxes, they were remote enough that they received none of the services these taxes supposedly paid for. The petition of 1801 did not quite achieve relief; the island continued to pay these taxes until 1874.

As of 1824, island residents held deeds to 36 lots. In Charles Pratt's Here on the Island, he suggests that if each lot was inhabited by a family of five, the island population at the time would be about 180 people. Survey maps from that era do not show anything resembling a town or a central area of homes on the island.

There is an unconfirmed report that during the gold rush of the 1840s, a large schooner was built by a group of islanders, and that this vessel was sailed to San Francisco.

At some point before the middle of the 19th century, fishing became the main industry on the island. Lobster had become a delicacy, and they were plentiful in this region. It is said that lobsters could be gathered in great numbers simply by taking them from the tidepools or dipping them out of the shallows. The waters around the island are filled with ledges, and this also made for prime lobster habitat. Since there was no need to venture too far out to sea, and lobstering was usually done from small boats known as peapods.

A lobster cannery was in operation on the thoroughfare from about 1860 to 1880. It was owned by a firm from Boston, and employed as many as 24 workers. In 1895, a minimum size limit was imposed when it was realized that the seemingly limitless supply of lobsters was beginning to dwindle. Large lobsters brought a better price when sold live (as opposed to canned), and during these years large lobster smacks with live wells would come to the island from as far away as Boston and New York about once a week, returning to their home ports with as many as 1500 lobsters in their wells. The lobster boom on the Maine coast reached its peak in about 1870, although lobstering continues to be a common occupation to this day.

By the late 1800s the population of the island had grown to about 275 and a town had developed on the thoroughfare. There was a trail leading to town from Head Harbor on the opposite side of the island. This trail was apparently well-used; one enterprising soul opened an ice cream parlor on it. At present, there is no evidence remaining of this trail.

By 1880, the first summer tourists had arrived in the form of a group of bachelors from Boston who began development of a complex known as The Point on the northern end of the thoroughfare. At about the same time, an entrepreneur from Bar Harbor built a hotel on the east side, but it burned to the ground after only two seasons. The Point complex still stands today.

According to the census taken in 1910, the island continued to be a thriving place with 178 year-round residents and 15 summer families who mostly lived at The Point. 35 of the year-round families were still supported by fishing and lobstering. There were two schools on the island with 29 students between them. The island had three general stores, two post offices, a boardinghouse, a barbershop and confectionery, an art store, a carpenter and a blacksmith. The library and the church had been built by this time and operated only in the summer.

During World War I, the island population was 133. A newspaper article from this time reports that the island community set a record by having 100% membership in the Red Cross.

Shortly before the coming of the Great Depression began a decline in the island population. In 1935, the total of year-round residents was down to 75 and that number continued to decline until it reached the level where it stands today, that being about 40 or 50.

Part of the reason for this decline in population is the advent of the motorboat. The advantage of living on and fishing from Isle au Haut was its proximity to what continued to be prime fishing waters. When powerful motors became standard equipment on fishing boats, it was possible to fish these waters from the mainland, without having to endure the remoteness and inconvenience of island life. It became more profitable to fish from a port on the mainland, and as more fishermen migrated there, the island population slowly diminished.

As of today, the island community is still healthy but it faces a continuing struggle to maintain itself. One issue of great concern is the school.

In order for the community to remain, there must be an influx of young families. The number of students in the school is small now, ranging from about three to eight. If it should happen that there are no students in a given year, the school would have to be closed, and it would be exceedingly difficult to have it re-opened. Without a school, the attractiveness of the island to young families would be greatly diminished, and the community could conceivably cease to be.

Note: Photos on this page were originally published in Here on the Island by Charles Pratt. These photos are uncredited, although Pratt speculates that they may have been taken by J. C. Turner around the turn of the century. These photos are in the public domain.