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Information Pages
 Like other Caribbean islands, St.Maarten/St. Martin was first inhabited by peaceful Arawak, Amerindians coming from South America and who called the land "Soualiga", which means Land of Salt. In the course of history, they were replaced by the fierce Caribs, the deformation of a name given to them when Christopher Columbus discovered the island and considered them as being cannibals. They were known for the beautiful canoes they used to build. Nowadays, they have disappeared from the island, but there is still a small community of Caribs left on the island of Dominica.  Columbus was not interested in St. Martin, but so were the Dutch, who arrived in 1624. In those times, the island was almost inhabited. In 1629, a group of French settlers formed a small colony in a place now known as French Quarter or Quartier d'Orleans. Due to the large amount of salt ponds on the island, French and Dutch harvested salt and cultivated tobacco, two products very much appreciated in Europe. In the following years, the island changed hands many times, while Spain, England, France and Holland were fighting for the control of the Caribbean. At the end, a partition treaty was signed in 1648 between France and Holland. Philipsburg, with its Fort Amsterdam and its shipping harbor, became the capital of Dutch St. Maarten, while Louis XVI ordered the construction of Fort Louis in Marigot, a harbor that became the French capital of Marigot in 1778.Prosperity came to the island first with cotton, then sugar cane plantations. Sugar cane was the origin of a prosperous rum production business. Of course, like other colonial powers, Dutch and French imported slaves from Africa to work in those plantations. But slavery was abolished on the French side in 1848 and on the Dutch side  about 15 years later, putting an end to the plantation industry that owned its prosperity to slave labor. Many inhabitants of St.Maarten/St. Martin left the island to work on nearby islands. But St. Maarten/St. Martin discovered a new base for prosperity, when the first KLM flight landed in 1942 on the newly build airport, inaugurated in 1944 by Princess Juliana. Soon, the main income sector of the island became tourism, which has been blooming since then. A new airport has opened its doors recently to accommodate the large amount of tourists and big jets arriving daily on the island.  Nowadays, there is no need for hard work in salt ponds and plantations. But both sides of the island are doing efforts to diversify their economy, for instance promoting other sectors, from agriculture to offshore business. Many of those who left the island came back in the meantime, and immigrants from other Caribbean islands came over to benefit from the tourism and construction boom. |
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