Past/Historical Land Uses
Pre-European
Earlier "Paleo-Indians" entered the region some 11,000 years ago. Successive periods of aboriginal use of the region are marked by developments in spear tips, pottery designs, agriculture, and palisaded villages, as revealed by archaeological work. The earliest archaeological site from within the LPBR is from the "Early Woodland Period" (ca. 900 - 400 BC). Another site from near Port Rowan dates from the "Early Iroquoian" period (ca. 900 - 1300 AD) and featured evidence of agriculture and a small double-palisaded village, as well as hunting, fishing, and gathering of wild plants.
A period referred to as "Neutral Iroquoian" (because the people there avoided aboriginal warfare among groups to the south and north) included the area of the present biosphere reserve, and lasted from about 1400 to 1650 AD. The European exploration, and subsequent occupations (with intense national rivalries) in North America from the 17th century on, resulted in extensive warfare among different alliances of aboriginal peoples with different European groups. These events lead to the defeat and dispersal of the "Neutrals" by the Senecas (an Iroquoian group) in 1651-1654 as the war zone moved north and west in association with the French fur trade moving through the upper Great Lakes. French explorers/missionaries had visited the Long Point area on three occasions during the "Neutrals" era; Dollier and Galinee explored the area more extensively in 1669-1670 and commented upon the destroyed villages as well as on the richness of the forest and "game" animals. Counter-offences originating in the upper Great Lakes eventually lead to the occupation of the Lake Erie north shore region by the Mississaugas (an Ojibwa group) in 1696. They occupied the area of the LPBR as occasional hunters, fishers, and gatherers, as did other rival aboriginal groups.
European settlement
After the British takeover of "New France" in North America in 1763, and the start of the successful 1776 war of independence in the United States (formalized by a treaty division of territories in North America by 1781) British occupation of what is now southern Ontario began to intensify in the 1790s. Upper Canada was incorporated in 1791, a treaty between the British and the Mississaugas in 1792 ceded lands, including the present LPBR area, and the first land surveys began in 1793-1794.
European settlement proceeded quickly under a British military governor (General Simcoe). Land surveyors laid out the concession lines and lots in a rectangular patterns for each township; each township had six concessions with 24 lots each. Walsingham Township (in the LPBR) was surveyed in 1795, and the surveyors kept notes on the forest cover and stream courses on each lot. (This has allowed for some reconstruction of the "original forest cover" in the biosphere reserve). The first European settlers (mainly "United Empire Loyalists - American Tories") began to arrive from the United States in the late 1790s. Early settlers were squatters. Later ones were allotted land on condition that they cleared the forest, created farms, and served when necessary in a militia. Roads were constructed along the concessions, and along some former Indian trails.
By 1812, some 3,000 settlers were in the area. One third of the forests had been felled by 1825 for lumber, clearing for agriculture, and charcoal production for a small iron-making furnace in the community. Port Rowan was founded in 1825. Following the sinking of four American schooners during a storm near Long Point in 1827 and a demand by the US government that a lighthouse be built, the first lighthouse at the tip of the point went into operation in 1830. A storm in 1828 also cut a channel from the lake to the Inner Bay near the base of Long Point and this was subsequently reworked and maintained as a ship canal with its own lighthouse during the 1880s and 1890s ("Old Cut"). A lifesaving station was built towards the base of the point near Big Creek in 1883. The entire point was sold by the government in 1886 to The Long Point Company, reportedly to get out from difficulties in policing the area.
By 1860 the best timber was gone from the area and the Long Point peninsula itself was clearcut. By 1900, only 11% of the forest cover was left. The exposed sandy soils were eroded by winds to the detriment of agricultural crops. In 1908, the government established the St. Williams Forestry Station (the first in Ontario) which has since been enlarged to 1,215 ha, to provide seedlings for reforestation of large cut-over areas and to establish windbreaks. Over the last 25 years or so, forest cover has remained at about 12% of the Long Point area (these calculations also include the aquatic portions of the biosphere reserve) and about one half of the land is agricultural.
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