There was also a local ship building culture dating back to the early 1700's. The ship building culture still exist in The Bahamas especially on the family islands, they mostly use the boats for the regattas. The Bahamas has even recently won the 2017 5.5 metre sailing championships, taking Gold and Silver. The Bahamas also has a gold medal in the star class at the olympics and another in the same class at the world championships.

Read this paragraph also from "Even the blacks" on page 301 if your comment is a racial one. https://archive.org/stream/travelsinconfede00schuoft#page/300/mode/2up/search/weekly+