Côte-Nord: History
The origins of the settlement of the Côte-Nord precede by a few millennia the population movements that began in the middle of the 19th century.
Archaeologists tell us that the main prehistoric cultures, called "archaic", were based on three sets of groups coming from the southwest, from as far away as the Great Lakes by the St. Lawrence River, those coming from the great plateaus of the interior and James Bay and those from Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and New England.
From the 14th to the 17th century, known history, the presence of Europeans in the regions of the North Shore and the Gulf of Saint Lawrence began with the periodic visits of the Basques and Breton fishermen.
Until the advent of the World War II (1939–1945) the growth of the population occurred in concert with the development of the pulp and paper industry.
In the 1950s, mining caused massive immigration.
"...From Kegashka to Blanc-Sablon, the inhabitants are individualistic, dwell on Crown Lands — often as squatters — and keep jealously to their self-appropriated fishing spots, whence their dispersion." (Bussières, P., p.1, 1963)