St. Helena Island featured a natural harbor on the its north shore that had long provided shelter for both Native Americans and Voyageurs seeking shelter from the lake’s notorious southwesterly storms. Upon setting foot on St. Helena in 1850, two brothers Archie and Wilson Newton quickly realized the commercial potential the area represented, and after purchasing the 266-acre island from William Belote in 1853, the Newtons established successful fishing, trading, lumbering and cooperage operations on the shore of the natural harbor. It did not take long for others to join them, and a thriving community of over two hundred people quickly grew to support the economic base the Newton’s had established.