Cannon Beach is surrounded by the rugged natural beauty of forests, ocean beaches, and rivers. Only four miles in length, and with a population near 1,600, Cannon Beach is a popular and picturesque resort area, playing host to an estimated over 400,000 visitors annually. Although Cannon Beach was incorporated as a city in 1957, it has been occupied much longer: first by native cultures, and then, since the late 1800s, by American settlers. In 1806, Captain William Clark, of the Lewis & Clark Expedition, traveled south to our area in order to secure needed blubber from a whale beached near the mouth of Ecola Creek.