In the 1850s Mackinac Island merchants recorded their fish purchases in this book.  In the left column are the names of the fisherman.  On the right are the signatures of merchants who shipped the barrels of fish to market.  The names reflect the different nationalities that lived on Mackinac Island in the 1850s.  Most of the fisherman were Irish, French, Canadian, Native American, and Metis.  By 1860 immigrants from Belgium, Prussia, Germany, Scandinavia, and Holland also moved to Mackinac Island as it began to reflect the swell of mid-nineteenth century European immigration to the United States. (1997.00.17)