Nolls Fly to Catalina Island, California

Catalina Harbor

People have been living on Santa Catalina Island for at least 7,000 years. Archaeologists excavating on a limited scale at Little Harbor on the seaward side of the Island for the past 40 years keep coming up with earlier and earlier dates. They find evidence of increasingly complex material cultures with a strong maritime adaptation. These earlier groups of peoples exploited the rich resources of the sea--from abalone and other mollusks, to small and large fish, and marine mammals such as sea lions.

The semi-arid Island offered limited plant resources, so the Islanders traded sea products and, in later years, steatite for their other needs. The Islanders made the 20-mile voyage to the mainland (and to the other Channel Islands) in well-crafted plank canoes. Steatite (an easily carved rock that does not crack when put in the fire) from Santa Catalina has been found in both mainland and Island sites throughout Southern California.