Ferrie came from a very industrious and wealthy family. He bought 300 acres of land and cleared 100 to construct what must have seemed like an empire to the earlier settlers: a stone mill for flour, barley and oatmeal, a distillery, a store, a cooperage (a factory producing casks and barrels) and several homes. The Ferrie companies became a major source of employment and prosperity for the growing community of Doon.
By 1852 the Ferrie enterprises included the grist mill (for grinding grain into flour), a saw mill, tailor shop, blacksmith, shoemaker, wagonmaker, cooperage, tavern, farm, distillery, the Doon Inn, two stores, eleven houses for its workers and twenty lots that were sold to residents. The population of the entire community according to the 1851 census was 452. Robert Ferrie also established a Post office and served as the Postmaster. By 1855, when Watson was born, Lower Doon was still essentially a “company town”.