![]() NPS Collections. People have come to Buck Island to enjoy the island’s beaches, waters, fish, and other wildlife, for nearly 2,000 years. By ca. A.D. 400, Amerindians living on St. Croix, who had arrived to the region via the Lesser Antilles and the Lower Orinoco River and Guyana coastal areas, began to visit Buck Island to fish, hunt lobsters and large land crabs, gather conch and possibly gathering sea turtle and bird eggs. Archeology has revealed that they camped in the beach forest, leaving behind pieces of pottery and their campfires, or hearths. ![]() NPS archives (St. Croix Landmarks Society) Oral histories collected from people who lived on Buck Island in the early 20th century described how they grew sweet potatoes, cut down trees to make charcoal, and raised sheep and goats. Hardly any sugar cane was grown here. Until the 1920s, leases were given so people could graze goats. Goats remained feral on the island until the 1940s. History of creation of the park. In 1926, a bill was introduced to the St. Croix Colonial Council to establish Buck Island as a game preserve, but because of its infestation with mongoose the preserve was not established. Under the Virgin Islands Organic Act of June 22, 1936, the Government of the Virgin Islands obtained direct control of Buck Island, though the U.S. Federal Government maintained control of the submerged lands. In 1948, the Government of the Virgin Islands established Buck Island and its surrounding reefs as a territorial park. In 1961, control of the island was transferred to the National Park Service, and later that year President John F. Kennedy, in recognition of the need to preserve for scientific and educational interests “one of the finest marine gardens in the Caribbean Sea,” established Buck Island Reef National Monument by Presidential Proclamation (No. 3443). Finally, on January 17, 2001, President William J. Clinton expanded the Monument’s size by 18,135 acres. |
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Last updated: April 6, 2018