Sop's Arm

Traditionally, the economy was based on the cod and salmon fishery, forestry, including sawing lumber and cutting wood for the Corner Brook Pulp and Paper Mill.

Watson Budden, a local resident, showed these in 1961 to Helge Ingstad, the archaeologist who investigated L'Anse aux Meadows, the only Viking settlement to be attested in North America, which is approximately 200 kilometres (120 mi) away.

His nephew Kent Budden assembled a collection of suspected Norse artefacts in the area and displayed them in a Viking museum.

Kevin McAleese, a curator of archaeology and ethnology at the Provincial Museum of Newfoundland and Labrador, led an investigation of the pits in 2010 and has said that no other cultures in the area are known to have use deadfalls to hunt, but doubts Budden's artefacts are Norse.

Sop's Island residents were encouraged to move by the Joey Smallwood Government to ease the economic burden of public education, transportation (of mail, food and other supplies) and utilities.