SANDUSKY BAY AND CEDAR POINT 237 
its junction with the Sandusky River south of Johnson’s Island 
and to within a mile and a quarter of the present mouth of Mill 
Creek. The islands of the Put-in-Bay group were still part of 
the mainland. Until about a thousand years ago the Indians 
might have walked from Sandusky to Kelley’s Island at any 
season, having merely to swim across one or two streams and 
wade through some marsh. East of Johnson’s Island the river 
may then have been as wide as the Portage west of Port Clinton 
is NOW. 
Before America was discovered the shore of Lake Erie was 
where Cedar Point is now, and at the time of the discovery was 
not far from Ridge 2 between the two lagoons. By this time 
Sandusky River valley had probably become wide enough south 
of Johnson’s Island to form quite a bay, which, however, 
extended less than two miles west of the island, though slack 
water and marsh continued several miles farther. 
When Jamestown was founded Pipe Creek and the streams 
beyond still entered the lake and not the bay. The land was as 
yet continuous from Cedar Point to Sandusky. West of the 
Bay Bridge was considerable marsh but little or no open bay. 
In the eighteenth century the bay was known to French 
traders. A French map of ‘Louisiana and the Course of the 
Mississippi’? dated 1718 was exhibited by the government at 
St. Louis in 1904. It shows Lac Sandouské. Other maps made 
in the eighteenth century also call it a lake. They show a nar- 
row opening into it from Lake Erie. The American Gazeteer, 
1797, says: “Sandusky Lake or Bay at the south-western side of 
Lake Erie is a gulf shaped like a shoe, and entered from the lake 
by a very short and narrow strait.’’ None of the maps of the 
eighteenth century give the outlines with any approximation to 
accuracy. The first actual survey of the region south and east 
of the bay appears to have been made by Almon Ruggles in 
1807. Map VIII shows a part of this survey, but Johnson’s 
Island and the Peninsula, although shown on the map, had 
evidently not been surveyed. 
Within the memory of Captain Freyensee and others still 
living bulrushes grew in all the water between Johnson’s Island 
and the Peninsula and in some other parts of the bay where for 
many years has been open water. 
LOOKING FORWARD. 
One can never be quite certain as to future events. It 
looks as if the peninsula that separates Biemiller’s cove from the 
bay, part of which has been land for thousands of years, would 
disappear in our own time. Now that the top of the clay has 
