It initially consisted of the District Municipality of Muskoka, the Territorial District of Parry Sound (excluding the towns of Powassan and Trout Creek and the townships of Nipissing, North Himsworth and South Himsworth) and the township of Sherborne and Others (formerly Sherborne, McClintock, Livingstone, Lawrence and Nightingale) in the County of Haliburton.

In 2005, legislation was passed by the Legislature to divide Ontario into 107 electoral districts, beginning with the next provincial election in 2007.

The eleven northern electoral districts are those defined for federal purposes in 1996, based on the 1991 census (except for a minor boundary adjustment).

Without this legislation, the number of electoral districts in northern Ontario would have been reduced from eleven to ten.

[3] While the riding is a stronghold of the Progressive Conservatives, it has also been friendly to the Greens, scoring only a little more than 2000 votes less than the PCs in the 2022 election.