Upper Chesapeake Bay

The upper Chesapeake narrows toward the mouth of the Susquehanna, where fresh river water enters the great estuary. Rivers and tidal creeks indent its shores, and oysters have long been an important resource in the bay. The Susquehannock claimed hunting grounds along the upper western shore when John Smith explored the Chesapeake in 1608. His voyages carried him among the many Indigenous communities of the bay and its tributaries, recording a landscape already occupied and named by its inhabitants.