Around the yards grew a fishing village. Noank ran a fleet of more than sixty vessels, many of them share-owned by the families who crewed them, and the harbor filled with the work of fishing, oystering, and lobstering. A velvet mill opened in 1905; the Connecticut State Lobster Hatchery took root around 1912; and the lobster shacks that still steam at the water's edge carry the same trade forward. Noank has always made its living from the Sound.
Long before the shipyards, the point belonged to the Pequot, who knew it as Nauyang — 'point of land' — and used it as a summer fishing and camping ground, documented here as early as 1614. The Pequot were forced from this coast in 1655, in the aftermath of the Pequot War; the removal was a dispossession, and it should be named as one. The village still carries the Pequot name it was given, and the Mashantucket and Eastern Pequot nations remain part of southeastern Connecticut today. Noank's story begins on Pequot ground.
Why People Visit Noank
Noank rewards visitors who like their shoreline quiet and real — a working harbor instead of a boardwalk, a dense historic village instead of a strip. People come for the boatyards and the lobster shacks at the water's edge, for the walk through the cottage-lined historic district, and for the view out to the Sound from the end of the point. It is peaceful, photogenic, and unmistakably a Connecticut fishing village.
