The economic center of the Port de Grave peninsula fishery in the 60s, Hibb's Cove today, for the most part have succumbed to the modern advances of an offshore crab fishery and a safe boat basin at Port de Grave harbour.

Hibb's Cove: Located east of Bay Roberts and north of Port de Grave, the change from Hibb's Hole to Hibb's Cove is relatively recent.

Information from the Port de Grave Peninsula Heritage Society's Website, suggests that there have been residents in the area since the 1690s (with the family name of Hibb) and that the change, which resulted from the community petitioning it to be changed, only occurred in 1968.

According to this source, before it was Hibb's Hole it was, in fact, Eb's (Ebenezer's) Hole.

One would assume many did not like the connotation of being a "hole", even though holes are simply "steep sided coves too small for a vessel to turn around, were usually named after the first person to put in there" according to the website, Local lore is that a there was "a planter named Hibbs who had three daughters who married a Lear, a Petten and a Kennedy living in adjoining coves".

From the website comes the following history of the community:

Hibbs Hole was mentioned in the first census in 1857 when there were 164 residents and the community was connected to Port de Grave by a road completed sometime after 1843.

The population reached 183 in 1869 and then declined to below 100 in the late 18005 and early 1900s.

The adjoining community of Pick Eyes was active from the early 1800s but reached a peak population of 88 a century later when it became part of the larger community.

In 1857 there were five boats with 12 nets and seines operating out of Hibbs Hole, but later on the inshore and Labrador fisheries involved as many as 76 people in cod and herring.

Twenty-eight fishermen and 20 fishermen-farmers were listed for the community in 1891. Farming also became important in the 1800s as the region's population increased....

The small settlement of Pick Eyes (or Pickey's) was first mentioned in 1784 and may have come from the original spelling of the names of William and Elias Picco who owned land in the area.

Reference to Pick Eyes or Pickey's was not found in any of the usual sources.

Used with permission from "Uncovering the Origin of 1001 Unique Place Names in Newfoundland and Labrador" 2021 Jennifer Leigh Hill

Address of this page: http://nl.ruralroutes.com/HibbsCove