Old Baldy Lighthouse And Smith Island Museum

History :

1600s And Before.
A destination for Native Americans, explorers, pirates, soldiers and sailors; fishermen and farmers for hundreds of years, Bald Head Island has evolved into a pristine hideaway for vacationers, historians and artists.

Smith Island's unique cultural heritage began more than 400 years ago. Long before French and Spanish explorers discovered the Cape Fear Region, Native Americans were fishing and hunting in the bountiful waters and forest of Bald Head Island. Midden sites (shell mounds created by the harvesting of oysters and other shellfish) have been found near the creeks.

In 1524, explorer Giavanni da Verrazano reached what is thought to be the Cape Fear River. In 1526, Lucas Vasques de Ayllon, a wealthy resident of Hispaniola, sailed with 3 large ships and 300 passengers up the Cape Fear River. When he lost one of his ships on the shoals, he and his crew rebuilt it on the island, thus constructing the first ship in the New World.

Sir Walter Raleigh's colonists mention the islands in their logbook of 1585: "We were in great danger of a Wreacke on a breache called the Cape of Feare." None of the attempts to colonize the Cape Fear area during the 1600s were successful.