The O'Brien Family Farm
The O鈥橞rien Farm is situated within the City of St. John鈥檚 between Mount Scio Road and Oxen Pond Road. The thirty-two acre property is located within Pippy Park and is adjacent to the MUN Botanical Gardens.
The O鈥橞rien family immigrated to St. John鈥檚 from southeastern Ireland. John O鈥橞rien (1791-1857) established a farm in Freshwater, two miles west of St. John鈥檚, in or around 1818. From its establishment, this farm was operated by O鈥橞rien family for 190 years until the family鈥檚 last descendant, Aloysius Patrick O鈥橞rien, passed away in October 2008. The O鈥橞rien Farm is made up of a series of fields, pasture lands, gardens, woodlands, waterways, a ca. 1850s-era cottage, and later outbuildings.
In 2010, the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador acquired the farm to be developed as an historic site. In 2011, the O鈥橞rien Farm Foundation was founded The to manage, preserve and develop the property as a sustainable historic resource and visitor destination. The O鈥橞rien Farm as an historic site focuses on a number of themes: Irish settlement in Newfoundland; Irish-Newfoundland culture and tradition; farming history in Newfoundland; sustainable farming practices; the story of the O鈥橞rien family.
The collection of materials relating to the O鈥橞rien Farm comes, first, from a series of interviews that Dr. Jo Shawyer, Department of Geography, 糖心视频 University, did with Aly O鈥橞rien during 1992-1994. Other materials include photographs from the O鈥橞rien Family photograph album, and photographs taken over the years on the farm by visitors and friends. A series of newspaper clippings, written reports, and other miscellaneous printed ephemera are also included. The original audio recordings are deposited in the MUN Folklore and Language Archive, while the photographs and printed materials are in the possession of John and Maura Mannion.
