 About 2.9% of families and 4.3% of the population were below the poverty line, including 6.5% of those under age 18 and 6.5% of those age 65 or over.Prior to World War II and Cold War-era expansions of nearby military bases and defense industries, and white flight from the nearby cities of Hampton and Newport News following the racial integration of schools that rapidly turned the area into a bedroom community, Poquoson was a sleepy rural area with many small family farms, commercial wharves, seafood packing houses, and boat yards that built and repaired log canoes, oyster buy-boats, and Chesapeake Bay deadrise work boats used by the local waterman.The annual Poquoson Seafood Festival which celebrates Poquoson's heritage is the biggest event in Poquoson.