foot race were then called on to decide who was the best
pedestrian, and was the most exciting scene of the day.
Mr. Bynam of Cape Traverse came in first, closely
followed by Mr. E McCarvill, Freetown.

As the sun was about to sink below the horizon, the
crowd began quietly to disperse, and wend their ways
to their respective homes, all concluding that they had
enjoyed themselves tolerably well; and heartily thank—
ing Mr. O’Ronaghan for the great day’s amusement he
had given.”

Although today’s horse racing fans will smile at the time
of three minutes for a mile, this was a respectable time for
amateur racing tracks at that time. But, as the report sug—
gests, this was more than just a horse race. It was a social
event for people of all ages and from many neighboring
communities. It was another of those community ‘frolics’
that helped build good social relationships between dif-
ferent communities. More details about this sport are pro-
vided in the advertisement on the preceding page, including
some problems associated with it.

John O’Ronaghan represents one of the first
entrepreneurs to emerge in these five communities; in fact,
he was described as “a great man who built Kinkorai’27 Born
in Ireland in 1838, and shortly afterwards an emigrant with
his parents, he had little formal education, but with
characteristic self-confidence he learned to be a business
and farm expert. His farm animals were frequent winners
at County fairs; he imported a racing stallion and built a
racing track on his farm; he was named a Justice of the
Peace, and was a delegate to Conservative leadership con—
ventions. He and his wife, Bridget Atkin had a family of
thirteen children, at their home they called “Shalimar Cot-
tagef’ But he is best remembered for some of his solutions
to cases brought before him as Justice of the Peace. One

38

such story tells how a local “fellow” was accused of distur-
bing the peace; he had been involved in drinking and
fighting. The Squire quickly delivered the sentence: “Guilty

as charged; you’ll hoe my turnips for four days?28
The maps on the following pages show the names and
property location of householders in the five communities

in 1880.29

Information about many of the householders listed on
these maps was obtained from the 1881 Census returns to

provide the statistical summary given in Table 4:1.

Table 4:1, Population of the Five
Communities, 1880-81

     
 
  

  
    
      

No. of Total_
Households Population|
Kinkora—Shamrock 60 384
Maple Plains 29 185
Middleton 27 173
Newton 39 250

    
 

Totals: - 155 992

     

These statistics suggest that there was a slight increase
in the population since the previous count made for 1863,
when there were 875 people in 135 households in these
communities. As previously, the majority of the
householders were farmers, however, as Table 4:2, on page
41 shows, there were more people with non-farming
occupations.