Grand Lake

Grand Lake spreads across a broad basin connected to the Wolastoq, or Saint John River, by the Jemseg. Its shores and neighbouring wetlands formed part of the homelands of Wolastoqiyik and Mi'kmaq people. Coal seams near the lake brought an early trade to these inland waters: in 1643 a vessel ascended the Saint John to load coal from the Grand Lake country. Before the middle of the seventeenth century, coal was being carried by water from the lake toward Boston.