It is named after the "cat line" of a sailing vessel which it resembles, and was once used by pirates Edward Teach, also known as Blackbeard, and Charles Vane.

While his original home burned, the cookhouse remained intact and its huge oven fireplace is part of the rebuilt cottage named Haigh House in his honor.

Wasey, an advertising executive from New York City, intended the island to be a winter home for himself and his wife and as a place to entertain clients and friends.

He employed Bahamians, sent a schooner to Cuba for handmade tiles from deserted churches and had men search the Florida swamps for angled pieces of wood needed for his Tudor-style buildings.

In World War II, Cat Cay was a paramilitary base for PT boats of the British and Allied Forces.

US General Hap Arnold, in charge of the US Army Air Corps, spent several months recuperating from a heart attack at Lou Wasey's Cat Cay home.

An Air Force officer stationed there, Monk Forster, fell in love with the island and returned after the war to manage the club and he acquired the home "High Tide", built by Wasey's partner O.B.

Lou Wasey built a nine-hole golf course that the former British king Edward VIII, later Duke of Windsor, enjoyed playing while Governor of the Bahamas during World War II.