Stanley Park began as a premier tourist destination in southern Ontario after James Long bought 50 acres at the northwest corner of the Village of Erin in 1888. In its heyday, the park featured a first-rate dance hall with big-name bands, boats for hire, a boathouse, numerous cottages, a dining hall, lunch counters, horse-powered rides, one of the earliest bicycle race tracks, a horse track, and sporting fields. John Carroll became owner in 1902 and implemented many of these facilities, and after Isaac Teeter purchased the park in 1908, his son-in-law Henry "Harry" C. Austin acquired it in 1916; Stanley Park flourished during the years from 1902 to 1916. A major reason for its success was easy public access by rail: the Elora branch of the Credit Valley Railway opened in 1879, the Village of Erin station stood almost immediately east of the park entrance across Main Street, and special excursion trains ran from Union Station to bring visitors from Toronto and beyond. One of the park's most historic events took place on September 19, 1908, when Tom Longboat of the Six Nations Reserve raced there just months after appearing at the London England Olympic Games and after winning the 1907 Boston Marathon, and he won a closely contested match. The park hosted honeymooners, extended-stay guests, family day trips, factory and church picnics, music and dances, fraternal events, reunions, and community gatherings including services for soldiers returning from the World Wars. Newspaper accounts said some events drew as many as 10,000 people, far more than the Village of Erin's population of about 600 in 1891. Upwells Limited bought the park in 1944 and developed a golf course, now Erin Heights Golf Course, as part of Stanley Park, retaining ownership until 2007, when Killam Investments Inc. purchased it. As tourism and leisure changed with the advent of the automobile, Stanley Park remained successful through the 1940s to 1960s but became more regional and local, and over time its recreational cottages became full-time residences as it evolved primarily into a residential community of the Village of Erin.