Corn Islands
Corn Islands
Corn Islands, two small islands about 40 miles off of the east coast of Nicaragua, near the coastal town of Bluefields. Little Corn and Great Corn islands became increasingly important tourist destinations in the late twentieth century. Their historical significance, however, derives from their location rather than their beaches. As part of its attempts to construct a canal linking the Atlantic and Pacific oceans, the United States sought and gained the right to fortify these islands to protect the approach to a potential canal across Nicaragua. The concession was part of a much broader struggle between Britain and the United States for control of potential canal routes as well as political and economic dominance throughout the Caribbean Basin in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. The islands also were considered as a possible resort by the dictator of Nicaragua, Anastasio Somoza, who invited U.S. millionaire Howard Hughes to Nicaragua to discuss plans for the islands in 1972.
See alsoBluefields; Somoza Debayle, Anastasio.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Additional Bibliography
Riverstone, Gerald. Living in the Land of Our Ancestors: Rama Indian and Creole Territory in Caribbean Nicaragua. Managua, Nicaragua: ASDI, 2004.
Romero Vargas, Germán. Las sociedades del Atlántico de Nicaragua en los siglos XVII y XVIII Managua: Fondo de Promoción Cultural-Banic, 1995.
Todd Little-Siebold