Block Island is much more than its beaches. It is a conglomeration of rocks and soil stripped by a glacier from what is now southern New England and pushed out into the sea, a varied terrain of hills and freshwater ponds seven miles long and three miles wide, lashed by savage winter storms and cooled by gentle summer breezes. This micro-climate has given it a unique community of flora and fauna, some flourishing, some rare, all precious. And Block Island is even more; it is a place where men and women have wrested a living from soil and sea for centuries. Originally occupied by the Manisses Indians, it was named after Dutch navigator Adrian Block, who stumbled across it in 1614, then settled by a party of English from the mainland in 1661. Their struggle to subsist is reflected in the community today - in the ancient stone walls, in the old cottages, farmsteads and mansard-roofed resorts, in the make-do traditions, the dependency on one another, the warm welcome to the visitor.