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Ormsby was equally successful in other spheres of activity. In 1890 the Native Land Court confirmed the Ormsby family's title to 3,161 acres of land at Te Kopua and he began sheepfarming. The land purchase officer in Otorohanga, G. T. Wilkinson, complained that the success of the venture was encouraging other Ngati Maniapoto to retain rather than sell their land, but he was confident that Maori sheepfarming would soon fail. Ormsby went on to help establish the town of Otorohanga. He was chairman of the Otorohanga Town Board and clerk of the first Waitomo County Council, and laid the foundation stone of the town hall. He employed his Maori relatives to manage the hotel, quarry, butchery, livery stables, land insurance and interpretation agency, and the bakery which he established. His farming ventures continued to flourish and he established the first local branch of the New Zealand Farmers' Union. Ormsby refused to act as agent for the Ocean Accident and Guarantee Corporation unless they accepted Maori risk; they relented.
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