The moth-eaten, linen covered old text, “Muskoka and Parry Sound,” circa 1870, has been evaluated by some antiquarian book dealers, to be worth between five hundred and a thousand dollars. It’s too bad author Thomas McMurray isn’t around to profit from the book’s increase in popularity. He could have used the resources way back when, as his Bracebridge mercantile, publishing, building enterprises tumbled into financial ruin, which as a matter of course had confounded many early business ventures in the late 1800’s in rural Ontario.

Thomas McMurray, if not a successful businessmen, was an exceptional writer, and dabbler in the fine word-craft of poetry. The first most important detailed writing, about Muskoka, came from the pen of the good Mr. McMurray, additionally the region’s first unofficial historian, although he probably didn’t wish to be known in this regard. His poems throughout the small settlers’ guide booklet are some of the best-known overviews of the Lakeland communities, his study of Grand Muskoka Falls being one of the most memorable.

McMurray was a passionate, some critics say over-zealous promoter of Muskoka, in the 1860’s and 70’s, when even the largest community wasn’t larger than a hamlet. In his book and in numerous print harangues in Ontario newspapers, McMurray would refute claims that Muskoka was unsuitable for agriculture, and being able to sustain a homestead population.

Thusly, as a counter measure, to be certain the region got the good ink he believed it deserved, he wrote poignantly and convincingly, that Muskoka was the literal “promised land,” of vast, untapped resources, and limitless potential. And his prose, and great literary vigour, found a vulnerable audience, one by the way that could ill afford any set backs, being penniless on arrival from England, Scotland, Ireland and Iceland. McMurray did not expend enough ink to inform new settlers that Muskoka had thick woodlands, a rocky disposition, was dotted with many lowlands, bogs and waterways, the latter demanding immediate construction of bridges. The soil was thin upon the great rock shield, and the growing season was markedly brief.

Although it is impossible to know how many settlers arrived in Muskoka based on McMurray’s advice, suffice to say, those who did realized within the first six months the author was more poetic than realistic. It may have been one of the earliest conflicts of interest, as McMurray’s business investments would surely have benefited from a larger settlement.

But McMurray’s descriptions of Muskoka are still revered none the less, and while he may not have been a financial genius, he was indeed a gifted writer.

Ted Currie is a freelance writer/historian in Muskoka always interested in new adventures, He can be reached at birch_hollow@sympatico.ca