HISTORY

The area has an aboriginal history that goes back thousands of years. The rock paintings at Petroglyph Provincial Park are evidence of a rich and active native community at on the Lakes. Lumbermen and settlers came in the 1840s but the strikingly beautiful yet marginal agricultural land surrounding the lake was not appreciated until families started camping on the islands in the 1880s. By the turn of the century a thriving summer population was permanently settled in cottages on the islands and along the shoreline. Arriving by steamboat from Lakefield, families would spend the whole summer on the lakes forming a community with its own unique social structure and entertainments. Hotels sprung up around the lakes beginning a tradition of hospitality that has carried on to the present day. Although the car opened up the whole lake to summer settlement, the sense of wilderness still exists on the rocky islands and pine forests. Older cottages blend in seamlessly to the natural landscape and early traditions are carried on by today's generation.