History of Sao Sebastiao

The first Portuguese to settle there were Diogo de Unhate, Diogo Dias, João de Abreu, Gonçalo Pedroso and Francisco de Escobar Ortiz, just after the division of Brazil in capitanias hereditárias. São Sebastião was part of the Captaincy of Santo Amaro. The place was first developed as an agriculture and fishing village. The agricultural activities transformed the village in a major sugar cane producer, which later helped the hamlet to earn its village status on March 16, 1636. To gain this status, though, the village had to build a church in honour of Saint Sebastian.

A few years after this, another hamlet developed just north of São Sebastião: São Francisco da Praia (Saint Francis of the Beach). In 1840, the hamlet took the first step to become independent: they asked it to become a freguesia. The request was eventually accepted in the same year, but the freguesia was disestablished in 1859 and re-joined to São Sebastião.

The city kept on basing its economy on the production of sugar cane, coffea, tobacco and fishing. The local port was widely used to load ships with gold from Minas Gerais during the 17th and 18th centuries. It was also used by pirates and smugglers.

When slavery was abolished, in 1888, and the railway linking São Paulo to the bigger Port of Santos was opened, the city's economy entered a period of crisis, and the population decreased. From that moment on, the city began to rely on subsistence agriculture and "handicraft fishing" (Pesca Artesanal), a type of fishing done entirely by hand since the fishing until the consumption (in other words, no machinery is used, and most of the people who practice it do it for subsistence as well)