To First Nations people in the region, Little Manitou is the lake of healing waters. Manitou is a Cree word for the Great Spirit or the Creator, and Sakahīcan means lake. The lake was a place where people gathered to heal those with skin diseases and other sicknesses. A legend tells of young men, ill during their tribe's move, who recovered after drinking and bathing in the water. Word of the lake spread, and settlers and then visitors from far away followed.
Manitou Beach incorporated as a resort village on August 11, 1919. In the 1920s and '30s it was the most popular summer resort on the prairies, a rival to Banff Hot Springs. Excursion trains ran to Watrous, a Canadian National Railway division point, and shuttle taxis carried visitors the rest of the way. The summer population could swell from 200 to 15,000. There were dance halls, bath houses, hotels, cottages, shops and a moving picture show, and the east and west beaches competed with each other.
Drought, grasshoppers and the Depression thinned the crowds in the 1930s. By the 1940s fires, a receding lake and new travel habits had pushed the resort into decline, and it stayed quiet until revival in the late 1980s and 90s.
Today the village is known for its salty, buoyant water, the Jubilee Drive-In (open since 1955), and Danceland, built in 1928 with a floor cushioned by horsehair. Camp Easter Seal, which grew from the 1930s Park Chalet, is Saskatchewan's only fully barrier-free camp. The village also hosts art studio trails and a chainsaw carving festival.
Written from Wikipedia’s article “Manitou Beach” (CC BY-SA 4.0), and shared under the same licence.