from Andrew Duffy of the Ottawa Citizen,
A new study suggests the Mounties had a powerful pacifying effect on the Canadian West that continues to be felt more that a century later — even in the NHL.
In research published this month by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, economist Pascual Restrepo shows that violent crime rates remain much higher in prairie communities that were founded far from an RCMP fort during the settlement of the West between 1890 and 1920.
What’s more, he says, the Mounties’ civilizing effect extends to the NHL: Statistics reveal that prairie-born players from areas historically outside the reach of the RCMP spent considerably more time in the penalty box during the past three decades.
Restrepo examined data from 737 NHL players from Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta who were active between 1980 and 2007.
Those who were born in communities first established more than 100 kilometres from an RCMP outpost were penalized, on average, 24 seconds more per game. That adds up to about 100 additional penalty minutes during a typical career.
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