Dawson Trail Dispatch
Celebrating Over 20 Years of Service to Our Communities!
July 2019
Ritchot Makes it New Bothwell into Top Five as Hosts Centennial a ParticipACTION Community
Unveiling the commemorative mural that recognizes 100 years of history in New Bothwell.
On June 22, New Bothwell celebrated the community’s centennial birthday with a party that drew hundreds of people. The event kicked off with a pancake breakfast, slow pitch tournament, photo booth, bouncers for the kids, and other activities for all age groups including paint afternoon, scavenger hunt and poker derby. The highlight of the afternoon was unveiling a mural that depicts different aspects of the community over the past 100 years. The community, which started out known as Kronsthal, was settled by Mennonites who emigrated from the Bergthal Colony, in south Russia back in the 1870’s. The name “Bothwell” originates with the establishment of the Bothwell School in 1919 about a half a mile east of Kronsthal. Not long after the new school opened, busi-
Submitted photos
nesses and families moved near the school and the village grew. The town, however, remained under the name Kronsthal until 1939, when the post office was established. At the time, a vote was taken by the community and the name Bothwell was chosen after the new school. After discovering another community with the same name, the word “New” was added.
Original school from which New Bothwell got its name.
During the month of June, residents within the RM of Ritchot competed to be named central Canada’s most active community after the municipality joined forces with ParticipACTION for a physical activity community challenge. At the end of the challenge, Ritchot residents logged a combined 1.4 million minutes of activity in over 200 events that was logged via the ParticipACTION app between May 31 - June 16. This placed them in fourth place in central Canada under Headingley who placed second. Both were the only Manitoba communities to make the list. “The competition was fierce and while we didn’t make it to the number one spot we were in the top 2% of Canada’s most active communities,” confirmed a Ritchot Recreation spokesperson. “Thank you to everyone who was active and logged their physical activity minutes, you all ROCK!” As part of the fun, the RM of Ritchot pledged $5,000 to the most active community based on physical activity time logged on the ParticipACTION app. At the end of the challenge, St. Adolphe was named the winner after logging the most minutes from all the communities in the municipality. To participate, residents were asked to track daily physical activity using the ParticipACTION app, the active app for everyone and inspire friends and family to do the same. In addition to encouraging residents to get out and get active, hands on demonstrations of some activities were available. Throughout the municipality ParticipACTION events such as rugby, lacrosse, archery and disc golf took place. The recreation committee even painted animal tracks in every community to encourage a scavenger hunt that was enjoyed by community members of all ages.