Christmas art clearinghouse

Last chance to share this bumper harvest of local newspaper Christmas-related illustrations by newspaper staffers and ad illustrators from the late 20's and early '30s.

Accommodation, 1922-style

From the Quebec Chronicle.

Old Quebec Xmas beer ads

1922

1923

1922

1917

Robert Brodie's memoirs- an excerpt

This is from a short unpublished manuscript written in February 1934 by Robert Brodie, 80, just months before he died. His family settled in lower NDG in 1807 from Scotland. The Brodies had a farm where Oxford Park is now. The beautiful old stone farmhouse was demolished by the Drapeau regime in spite of promises to devote it to community usage. This excerpt deals with his family's experience in the Rebellion of 1837. Unclear words are marked by a question mark.

Papineau and his followers went the wrong way about it by declaring war against the English settlers and arresting those neighbours who had shown them nothing but kindness. My father and my Uncle Hugh were Officers in the Militia. My Uncle was a Captain in the Lachine Troop of Cavalry.

Some of the rebels were very cruel. They beheaded James Walker, a Laprairie farmer, who resisted arrest, and walked with his head on a pole to Caughnawaga. Another case was that of Angus Cameron of the Bean River who was not given time to put on his boots, but made to walk two miles over the frozen ground to Ste. Martine. They were also rough with my Grand Uncle James Holmen (?) who was lame and infirm and could not walk.

There was a character named McLean who lived in a log house near the river. When the rebels hammered at his door, he climbed up the chimney, and stood on the cross bar on which they hung the kettle, and called to his wife “Janet saw me me brask.” (?) In the meantime, the rebels broke into the house, and when she was tugging on his breeches, the cross bar broke, and down he fell, all covered with soot. They took him for the “Diable” and ran away. However, they finally plucked up courage and returned, and tied him up with a rope they found under his bed. McLean said, “It is the first time I have been tied up with me own rope." The rebels marched with their prisoner to Caughnawaga, thinking the Iroquois were with them, but the Indians let out a war whoop, and arrested the rebels, and let the English go free.

The rebels paid dearly for their cruelty. They were badly defated at Odelltown, not far from Hemmingford and also at St. Eustache, nort-west of Montreal. Father and Uncle Hugh were in the engagement, and father was sorry for the poor beggars. They went into the Church for safety but were shelled by the English, and until the present day there are marks of bullets on the walls of the old Church.

Jessica Jolin - how to screw up your job before even getting there

This wacky story from local bikini model Jessica Jolin. We believe it can be thoroughly instructive to those with sharp minds and eyes.

I was running late for a job in Montreal and while driving, I cut another car off on the highway and nearly caused an accident. I arrived at the studio minutes later, only to find that the woman whose car I had almost hit was the photographer’s assistant!

Roots of the Green Bottle Legend - the conclusion

We've discussed how the famous short story about Green Bottle Street was based on an article about real life Montreal city hall street-naming guy Albert Garand (pictured disapproving of the Inspector Street sign). Coolopolis found that historic Montreal Standard article and popped it up, now for the conclusion.
----
"So, to adjust matters, it was named De Bullion by the city, after a famous and respected personage. Whether it has had the effect intended is not, of course, for me to say."

I remarked on the great number of saints' names in Montreal.

"Most of them," he said, "were actually named by early residents. A man whose first name was Hubert, for instance, would call the place he lived on St. Hubert. This was a common practice in the old days. There are more than 200 such names in the city."

Garand took time out here to reproach mildly the street-car operators who have won admiration by giving by French and English versions of one name, as in Gui-Guy.

"Guy street was named after a Madame Guy who resided there," he said. "The English version is quite wrong. You might as well call Park avenue Le Parc. But it's the custom now.

"Or take Inspector street. This was named after a superintendent of the water supply system years ago. It should be Rue de l'Inspecteur, but I don't suppose it will ever be remedied."

As far as the renaming of old streets is concerned, Garanda's work is practically finished. It is true, he says, that old names will be changed from time to time to honor someone or some event, but it's an expensive business.

The name plates cost about 3 cents each, and are made, shocking as it seems, in Toronto. But when scores of such plates have to be ordered, and new maps drawn and files changed, the cost adds up. It has to be pretty important before a street name is changed now.

"There is one little thing I'd like to see decided before I retire," Garand says. "There's a little street downtown called after a Micmac chief known to the early settlers. And no one knows yet whether his name was Chagoumigan or Chagoumigin. It's a little thing, but I'd like to see it settled."

There you are. If you're interested in naming a new section, and your ideas have merit, pass them on to Garand. Because he has as much to do as anyone in deciding the question.

An obscure job, but it's made time fly for him in his 35 years at City Hall.

More urban nostalgia - the Haw Field at Guy and Sherbrooke

Coolopolis Towers is housed in a former kettle factory. We have a big collection of old kettles on display to keep the spirit alive. But other buildings, such as one at Guy and Sherbrooke, is built on a field of dreams. Here's an excerpt from a book we'd love to find, discussing the spot c. 1890.

The Haw Field ex: from Enchanted Days in Montreal by W.G. Radford
14 August 1948 Gazette

The playground for the youth of the neighborhood was the "Haw Field" at the corner of Sherbrooke street and Cote des Neiges Hill. Right on the corner, outside the field, a couple of old ladies were established in business in the summertime, and here you could buy a ginger hand for one cent of a glass of spruce beer for one cent - reasonble prices when you bear in mind that it was on Sherbrooke street.

The entrance to the Haw Field was through a hole in the fence made by removing one of the boards, and to this field the smaller boys of the neighborhood gravitated as soon as they could get away from parents, nurses or elder sisters. Some of the great footballers and hockey players of Montreal got their first introudction to sports in the Haw Field. It had its own peculiar games: "tip and run" and "two in for bats" were favorites of our day.

"Two in for bats" had the advantage that any number of boys from five to 20 might play it. I cannot understand why it has not been more widely adopted; for it has a number of advantages over the great American game of baseball which it slightly resembles. In the first place, you played it with a rubber ball, which anybody knows is easier on the hands; and you did not have to catch it on the fly, for, if caught on the first bounce, the batter was out - and both these features were popular with the smaller boys.

Another distinct advntage of the game was that you had an opportunity to play in every position in thef field - in the infield, the outfiled, and the far outfield. As you worked your way up to the infield, to pitcher, to batter, and were out, you retired to the far outfield and did the same thing all over again, I think you will agree with me that this feature was a great improvement on the American game, as there was no loafing and everyone was in action all the time.

The diamond was not quite equilateral. The first base was a tree, the second base a rock that prodtruded slightly from the ground and was distinctly off center, and for the third base we used somebody's coat. One Saturday we cut the fingers off our Sunday kid gloves; for in those days all nice little boys wore kid gloves on Sunday. We felt that the gloves might improve our game, but on arriving home with the fingerless gloving the "Haw Field" was declared out of bounds for some weeks.

Years later I stood at the Haw Field corner and wondered where the scores of boys who had played there had scattered to. A nursemaid came by with a child in a pram and another walking. I enquired of her where the little boys of the neighborhood played nowadays and she did not seem to understand. On pressing her I learned that she had never heard of "two in for bats" or "tip and run" and that she had no desire to engage in conversation with strange people.

I stood sadly in the street and looked over the pile of masonry that has transformed the Haw Field into a revenue producing proposition. The echo of the shrill voices of the happy playful youngsters of long ago seemed to be in the air.

Mystery Solved....Ethan Allen's house of humiliation now a daycare...

We asked about this famous Montreal building and what became of it. It was moved by truck in 1970 and eventually transformed into a daycare for about 40 kids.

Here's why is was a famous place, long version.

Anti-Brit Vermonter Ethan Allen met up with Mayor John Brown in Richelieu and they agreed to take over Montreal from Longeuil, the other from La Praire.

Allen took off from Longueuil with 150 men, crossed the river on the night of 24 September 1775 and got shelter in Longue-Pointe while waiting from Brown's signal. Brown never showed.

So Major Carden - who would die on the battlefield - was sent by Governor Guy Carleton. The Brits took Allen and 35 of his men prisoner and chained them up in this home. Allen was gently persauded to sign his surrender papers.

Allen was put in a dungeon in Pendennis Castle in Falmouth, Cornwall, returning to the States in a prisoner exchange three years later. Allen's work helped Vermont join the States in 1791, but was already dead, perishing 12 February 1789.

Allen's daughter, Frances Allen, aka Fanny Allen, moved to Montreal in 1807 to learn French. She became a nun at the Hotel Dieu hospital 29 September 1808 and died 10 December 1819.

So what became of this historic house? On 11 June 1970 it was removed from its original location at 230 Notre Dame East (between the CN viaduct and Dickson). It was transported to 201 Mercier right near the water, east side of Honore-Mercier Park.

The original eight acres of land was acquired by Pierre-Joseph Huppe between 1665 and 1668. It was snapped up in 1712 by Jacques Picard, whose family kept it until 1801 when Jean-Philippe Leprohon got it from the notary Louis Picard Junior. The actual building was built in 1739-1742. (How do we know this? Chimples told us. It loaded into his brian implant in the form of Guy Pinard's Montreal: Son Histoire, Son Architecture Tome 6, Meridien 1995).

In 1969 the building was owned by Canadian General Transit Company - a subsidiary bought by A.V. Roe, aka Avro - which built petroleum and chemical tank for railcars. They gave it to the city on the condition that it be moved by the end of 1969, otherwise they'd demolish it. So the 600 ton building was moved three miles east June 1970 by Roger Bisson Inc. for a cost of $50,615. It was barricaded from 1970 to 1985 and became the Centre de la petite enfance Becassine owned by Denise D'Astous, which watches about 40 toddlers.

They signed a 35 year emphaceutic lease. None of the original stuff inside was kept. The windows, doors, chimney, are regrettably changed, blame the city, not the daycare.

Montreal's Eden Wax Museum - always enlightening and uplifting!

Nothing like characterizing Chinese immigrants as dope-addicted hostile drug dealers. These wax figures were on display at the Eden Museum inside the National Monument National on St. Lawrence and Dorchester, (once the property of the Gravenor family, but we're saving that story for subscribers). The museum was eventually closed by the St. John the Baptist Society which bought the building. They frowned upon its tawdry contents.

Bloodthirsty terrorists among us...

The since-you-asked department:

Francois Schirm is alive and still being annoying in Laval. Chimples called him today using the voice synthesizer. He had it on Shirley Temple, but I switched it to DeNiro just before Schirm answered.

Schirm, now having breathed our precious air for 75 years, sounded crazy as crazy can be. After a couple of seconds on the blower, the old f _ _ l said "non merci" and hung up.

He was from Hungary, moved here in 56 & got involved in some bad separatist stuff. Two employees died violently in one of his early antics, knocking off a gun shop on Bleury in 1964. He and another guy were sentenced to death but that was commuted and he remained quite proud and unrepentant of what he did while serving 14 years in prison. He became a truck driver but launched a petition in 1985 to try to get even easier treatment for the FLQ dickheads doing time inside. Here's a photo of him looking particularly cocky immediately after the murderous events of Aug 64.

What happens in Vegas comes to Montreal

In the latest Oceans flick, Brad Pitt and George Clooney get all sentimental about the changing face of Las Vegas. Now compare those guys to John Archer, the Montreal artist and business columnist: he does more than just talk. Archer and his camera have been capturing the true Vegas soul in all its fading glory, while sometimes being stalked by dubious characters -- all to record the Nevada strip in the same neon hues that turn midnight into noon.
Now Archer is set to unveil some of his most acclaimed pieces at a six-day show titled, Once Vegas: Motels, Swimming Pools and Trailer Parks. The vernissage runs from 6-9 p.m. on Tuesday 18 Dec. at Galerie Le 1040, at 1040 Marie-Anne St. East -- that's between Boyer and Chistopher Columbus Streets, if you're just jetting in.
The show, which is co-sponsored by the McGill Institute for the Study of Canada (as part of its MISC Goes to Town series of cultural events held across Montreal), runs through Sunday, Dec. 23. By the way, Chimples will be there, if -- and it's a big "if" -- he eats all of his Costco bananas (he's been on an organic swing).

Opening 85 years ago this week

It's condos and shops now. This Wikimedia angle shows the De Maisonneuve (then Western Ave.) side.

Keith Pearson - local anti hero killed by his own buds

Keith Pearson, aka Rocky Pearson had a business in Ville Jacques Cartier, now a part of Longueuil. He managed a construction firm. He was a big boy, a former boxer, known as the White Wolf.

Pearson was in in his 30s when he reached some serious status as a criminal, bank robbery, dealer and fixer of municipal elections. If you needed to win an election, you'd definitely be texting this guy.

He'd send over his tough guys to intimidate the opposition and jam ballot boxes. He was close to Léo-Aldéo Rémillard, who became mayor of the fast-growing town on the south shore in 1960, only to have his mayoral title stripped by a special provincial law passed in 1962 to prevent those with criminal records holding such jobs.

26 June, 1961 Keith Pearson was reported missing by his girlfriend. Cops got an anonymous tip and they found his body half buried in Saint-Amable-des-Varennes.

Frank Watson, 42, was Pearson's bodyguard/chauffeur. Watson was also an ex-con and an RCMP informant, paid $100 a week salary. Watson tells the RCMP who killed Pearson. But he tells police nothing, thereby keeping his cover. He waits for arrests. No arrests follow.

Two years go by and suddenly cops arrest four of Pearson's own men for the murder of their boss, they are: Rosaire Daoust, George Aird, Armand Larose and Raymond Caza.

Donald Cote, another wheel in the Pearson gang, is shot three times while leaving the hospital where his wife just gave birth. He survives. The trial of the Pearson gang begins. Legendary anti-crime Crown Prosecutor Claude Wagner takes on the prosecution.

The informant Watson - who meanwhile had been savagely beaten with a baseball bat in Ottawa - is no longer under cover. He tells the court that he returned from fetching hot dogs on June 26 at 4 p.m. to see three other guns pointed at him. He figured the boys had learned he was an informant and had just minutes to live. But in fact Pearson's own boys had just shot their boss. The boys force Watson to crack the unconscious Pearson on the head. Watson says Pearson was already dead anyway.

The sides rested their cases in March '64 but the jury quarreled, necessitating a retrial. May '65 they tried again. Same result. Two hung juries. No convictions.

Cote was acquitted on accessory charges. He learns to deal with his bullet-riddled body.

Pearson gang members Aird, Caza, Larose (who had since lost a leg from a car bomb September 10, 1962) and the American Edward Callaghan were convicted of an earlier bank robbery organized by Pearson and committed in January 1961 at a St. Hyacinthe Caisse Pop, which netted $133,000. The four were sentence to long prison terms in February 1966.

(Sources: Les Grands Proces du Quebec by Daniel Proulx, 203-210 and Le Crime Organise a Montreal 1940-1980 by Pierre de Champlain, p 125-129.)

Ahh...The Bonfire! This joint was at the corner of Decarie and Jean Talon (pronounced Gene Tallin). It's around where the Burger King/Wal-Mart thingy now sits. It was famous for being a real big time Mafia hangout. Anybody want to add some stories or will you make us do it?

..Quiz ...

Who is this French-born, Vietnam-raised local TV journalist - shown as a student in 1962 - and of what declining talent did she more recently become a symbol?

Answer: her name is Michele Viroly and she was a long-serving newsreader for one of them stations. Her claim to fame was her impeccable enunciation. Some guy wrote a picaresque novel caled I Miss Michele Viroly.

When Tony Percy died, Montreal died...well, not really, but it sounds good

Chimples The Intelligent Chimp posted this souvenir postcard a few months ago before his heart transplant and Brain Implant issues. It features local pugilist Tony Percy, who bears a ridiculous resemblance to another subsequent local boxing bum whose name I surely don't need to tell you because it starts with Dave and ends with Hilton. We neglected to mention the WATN (where are they now?) component of this story. Tony Percy was murdered September 9, 1962. He was killed while feuding with a restauranteur named Nicolas Vriniotis, who wasn't charged. Once again, sounds rather Hiltonian, don't it?

Quiz of Santa Claus

45 years ago this guy proved himself to be the meanest Santa imitator in history. What'd he do?

Here's your solid answer: He is Georges Marcotte, 32 (in 1962 anyway) the Santa Claus killer who robbed a bank on Cote-de-Liesse on December 14, 1962 dressed - along with his two accomplices - as Santa Claus, killing two St. Laurent cops while doing it.

The bank robbers were supposed to rob a bank on December 13, but Marcotte showed up late to the meeting. They got $5,600 in cash and $56,000 in travellers cheques. Jean-Paul Fournel, 39, who spent the 50s in prison, was quickly caught and rolled on his accomplices. The third bank robber, Jules Reeves, was easie to find, as he had suffered a brain aneurysm and hospital emergency staff found $1,297 in his pocket, a big sum at the time. (Cops and medics usually pocket that kinda loose loot - Chimples the Increasingly Intelligent Chimp, editor). Reeves died in the fall of 1963 of his brain injuries, never having faced charges.

The robbers had purchased machine guns legally on Bleury from International Firearms, run by Jeffrey Wiessler. They had used a car, obtained illegally, for the ride.

While on trial Marcotte's eponymously named dad, a taxi-driver, 59, claimed that he was with his son driving on St. Lawrence when the hold-up took place. His evidence was that he was listening to the police awards on the radio. Further checks proved that it wasn't on the radio except for a brief mention on the English-language CJAD.

Witnesses testifying in the case include Sgt-Det Douglas Stone, Engineer Garland Sheridan, Randy Young, waitress Dorothee Pincince and Harold Green.

Marcotte was sentenced to death but it was commuted to life in prison, which he served in Stony Mountain, Manitoba. He was paroled in 1981 under the condition that he not return to Quebec.

One incredible twist to the trial: Fournel confessed to having knocked off the same bank previously with the assistance of Andre Crafcenko. The duo had done it on the instructions of Trajan Constantin, who was serving as an assistant to their defence lawyer at the time. Constantin went from lawyer to accused immediately. Constantin was outraged. But then he fled to France and disappeared. He apparently went around telling people in France that he fled Quebec as a FLQ political prisoner. Yet another FLQ weirdo in Europe story.

Denis Brabant, when he died in 1962 had three children, Pierre Brabant, 8, Marie-Claude Brabant, 6, and Chantal Brabant, 3. Claude Marineau's kids included Micheline Marineau, 14, Lise Marineau, 10, Alain Marineau, 3. There's a street named after the cops in St. Laurent.

Perspectives in photography

He's sipping from a man sized beer. She sips from a 6 ounce coke while a stripper with chunkalicious thighs waltzes about in the background. Chimples has declared this the best Montreal photo ever taken.

The final Urlaubszeit

Less than three months before Hitler's invasion of Poland sparked World War II, the local office of the Deutsche Reichsbahn (which was in the Dominion Square Building), was still taking out newspaper ads --like this one from June 17, 1939 -- in hopes of charming Montrealers into visiting their Nazi-infested country.

Scenes from the Main

The Casa Loma was a three drinkery complex at 94 St. Catherine East, just east of the Main. It had a bar, a strip club, a disco and a bar called the Jacques Antonin. It's currently the digs of the the Club 281, a relocated male strip bar.

12 March 1971 at 5:00 a.m. a handful of people were drinking after hours. Go-go dancer Paulette Gingras, 19, was enjoying a nightcap (morningcap?) with her boyfriend Jean-Claude Rioux inside the Jacques Antonin bar.

Sharing the table with the loving couple of Rioux and Gingras was a hothead named Jean-Marc Morin, 32, who allegedly approached another guy named Jacques Verrier, who he claimed owed him $500. Morin screamed at Verrier.

Verrier's friend, the barman Andre Vaillancourt asked the angry Morin to pipe the fuck down.

Instead the hotheaded Morin made an extra hole in Verrier's noggin. Then he shot Vaillancourt dead and fled. That's one version of events anyway and there are others.

Two men dead. But the action wasn't over yet.

There was a trio at another supposedly unhappy with Rioux for bringing such a murderous asshole into the bar. That table included Joe Di Maulo, 28, the manager of the disco (he'd go on to allegedly become a major player in the local Calabrian mob) Joe Tozzi, 45, who ran the Casa Loma and Julio Ciamarro, 28, a friend who ran the Caesar's Palace restaurant on Hutchison.

So ..according to this unconfirmed version ...the trio held Rioux back and Rioux was killed 25 minutes after the other duo, dead of a slashed throat.

So even though Rioux had nothing to do with Morin's shooting rampage, he was killed as punishment for sharing a table with Morin, who had fled, once again, this was according to a one version of events.

Morin, the alleged hothead gunslinger, was arrested at his home, but only after police shot him in the leg trying to flee.

So, recap time: the story has it that Morin shot two men dead in the bar. This caused the unrelated trio to kill Morin's friend Rioux, through an anger-by-association deal.

The three managers were tried for murdering Rioux. They hired lawyerly all stars Raymond Daoust (who founded Allo Police as a vanity rag), Sidney Leithman (who was gunned down in an assassination later on) and Leo-Rene Maranda.

The lawyers counter interrogated Paulette Gingras until her testimony wobbled. Next up was barman Yvon Metras, who couldn't remember much. Gordon Bull, the night guard repeated much of what Gingras said.

26 November 1971, after a dozen days of deliberation the trio were found guilty of premeditated murder of Rioux. They were sentenced to life.

As for the shooter Morin? Here's the shocker. When it came time for Morin's trial, Rioux's girlfriend Gingras totally changed her original testimony. Gingras now claimed that it was actually her boyfriend Rioux who murdered the duo. Rioux - Gingras' dead boyfriend - couldn't go on trial. The stripper's shocking flipperooni led Morin to be acquitted on 10 February 1972.

Gingras later reverted to her original story but by this point her credibility was shot to bits.

The three Italians were retried and acquitted 1 February, 1973.

Here's a photo of St. Lawrence near Viger. It was demolished for the Ville Marie Expressway.

St. Lawrence and St. Antoine.

The legendary St. John's Cafe on the Main.

Post mortem: 1234 Mountain

That lineup-y club just down the street from Ogilvy's used to be a funeral home. Here's the current logo plus an ad for the same premises as published in the Herald back in '56.

Coolopolis babe du jour quiz....this is for all the apples!

This rock`n`roll drummer is everywhere in town endorsing a product. What is it? Answer time! This is Eric Tscappeller, musician, drummer, scenester, who doubles as a male model and whose likeness is festooned on cheese billboards throughout this glorious cold city.
This local starlet launched her thespian career on an underrated locally-shot TV show about a high school paper. Who and what? This is Victoria Sanchez of Student Bodies.
This waitress at a local Japanese restaurant has more of something than any other Montrealer. What ? Friends on Facebook. She has 1,215 of them at last count, ranking her number one in the Montreal area. Her name is Ping Raddavone Banouvong. She tells Coolopolis that. "I think I have a friendly face. I get at least 10 friend requests daily."
This studly young man whips up a mean expresso at a coffee shop that`s only been around for a couple of years but would appear to have been there forever. This young man, whose name shall be revealed once we figure it out, is king of the expresso counter at Shaika cafe on Sherbrooke Street, managed by the fabulous Tracy Biddle.
This wide-smiling hipster once brought a touch of class slinging beer at one of the citys least renovated pubs, which has never quite recovered since her departure. What was it? This is Kavita, who once graced the staff of the Miami Bar on St. Lawrence, "a long time ago," in her words.

A public service announcement

Radio - not CO2 - is heating the globe!

So global warming's going to get us, eh? That's what Chicken Little's saying these days. Back in the '60s, it was overpopulation. The '70s? Famine. The '80s? Nuclear war. Of course in the '90s, it was Celine Dion and Nickels. Nowadays, global warming is "going to drown us all." But if you thought global warming was a new concern, you're off by at least 75 years. Back in the winter of '32-'33, Montrealers were jumping to conclusions about a succession of balmy, damp winters. One city newspaper stopped chaps in the street to ask...

DO YOU THINK OUR WINTERS ARE CHANGING?

D. Rivenna (6555 Garnier Street). I've been in Canada for 16 years, but it's just been for the past five years that I've noticed such a complete absence of snow. I remember when I arrived here, I thought all the snow was beautiful. But now I think Canadian winters are just sad.

Ernest Aubin, electrician (6557 Chambord Street). For the most part, Canadian winters don't change. Most people of a ripe age say, "In my day, we would ride a sleigh to grandpa's on New Year's Day," or, "When I was young, there was a lot more snow in the winter." Meanwhile, meteorological reports contradict such thinking. Every year, journalists restate the facts, but every year, people of a ripe age insist that the climate has changed.



Pierre Michel, marble cutter (7789 Casgrain Street). I've only been in Canada for six years. Before I came, I was told that winter was beautiful, especially around the time of the holidays. But I have only experienced a depressing climate, and in the winter there is at least as much rain as snow. For every day of nice weather, we're bogged down for three in the mud. It's a big change for me after the beautiful sky of Italy!




V. Deradeau, "operator" in a factory (6545 11th Avenue, Rosemount). Canadian winters have definitely changed a lot. I don't know what's causing this phenomenon, but it's plain for anyone to see. When I was a child, there were enormous snowbanks in the streets of Montreal. Nowadays, the unemployed are lucky if they can shovel a few feet a winter!



G.H. Charbonneau, fashion illustrator (7028 Chambord Street). Meteorologists will tell you straight out: "Over the past fifty years, we have had warm winters and cold ones, ice-free and snowy winters. It will be the same for the next fifty years. Our New Year's Days have the same old-time feeling and always will. There is no evidence in living memory that the climate has changed even a little. Weather reports are there to back this up." Nevertheless, common opinion denies these facts. Personally, I don't have any opinion.

R. Laurin, salesman (1218 Bellechasse Street). I am of the mind that our Candaian winters have changed, but I'm not so sure that it's not just an illusion. People say winters aren't like they used to be, in the same way they insist the phases of the moon predict rain and fair weather. However, experts regularly insist that there are no connections between the moon and weather conditions. They also maintain that North American winters don't change "on average." I guess we should take them at their word.

J.A. Berube, commercial traveler (6622 Delaroche Street).
Canadian winters have changed considerably. When I was a child, we put on our snowshoes at the beginning of December and sometimes used them right through mid-April. We blame changing temperatures on many things: deforestation, the displacement of the Gulf Stream, the abusive use of electrical waves and radio frequencies in the atmosphere, etc. Whatever the cause, I think it's futile to deny it's happening. All our seasons are out of alignment.

Quiz of the day - what's up with this guy?

Cecile Dionne, of the famous Dionne quintuplets got married 50 years ago to this strapping young hunk. It was a big deal at the time. The wedding attracted a real media blitz, a reported 10 photographers were there!! She was marrying Rad-Can technician Phillippe Langlois, 26. Cecile was 23. They had a $10,000 wedding which saw her sporting 12 metres of silk and 10 metres of Swiss lace and embroidered with seed pearls that required 40 hours of hand-stitching - according to her biography published in 1999. She was a nurse, barely 5 feet tall. They moved to Dorval for a bit in 1959. But he was a heavy drinker, (although not as heavy as the Chief Security Officer at Coolopolis Towers Omer Legault). One day Cecile realized something about her husband that eventually doomed their marriage which ended in 1963. What was it that she realized?

Quiz answer!: He was, as Mr. Dayton correctly guessed in the comments section, a man's man. Soon after their glorious nupitals Cecile came downstairs only to find him in the arms of another man. Their priest told her to forget about it. She did. Sorta. Until she came downstairs again one day and found 10 men having an orgy in the kitchen. She shooed them all out, including her hubby.

The mob uncorked

More than one Montreal mansion was built on booze dollars that flowed north from bone-dry Probitionist U.S.A. But as the dry movement collapsed, the gangsters who had it so good running rum over the border started worrying about where their next crooked bucks would come from. If this 1932 editorial holds water, about 50 mob heavyweights had a conference in Montreal to coordinate their next moves -- including a plan to monopolize the beer market before the old breweries got back on their feet. It never happened, we suppose. Eventually, of course, they found other ways to make a buck: extortion, loan sharking, dope peddling, gambling, money laundering, etc.


GANGSTERS IN MONTREAL
Editorial, Le Petit Journal
11 December 1932

For some time now, American gangsters have been choosing Montreal to hatch their criminal plots and crimes. They better think twice. People won't tolerate any attempt to pass Chicago's dubious torch this way.

It's a well-known fact that the most powerful American gangsters thrive on contraband alcohol to one degree or another. But the coming repeal of the 18th Amendment will undermine their way of life and all their plans. They will either have to adapt to new circumstances or else disappear. Still, their wicked ways are too profitable to give up. So they'll try to adapt.

Our readers know that as part of these efforts, about fifty of the most powerful gang chiefs recently met in Montreal in odrer to coordinate their strategy. What a fine catch they would have made!

Naturally, they did not announce their decisions. Nor did they issue a press release. But their plans are known. They are playing with the idea of assembling $30 million, which anyone but these guys would be hard pressed to do these days. And they seek to put their hands on the entire North American beer industry. Once their monopoly is in place, they will control the market for all intents and purposes, and will impose their will, their crooked rackets and their corruption.

News of their project came to the attention of the big distillers and breweries, who have expressed their concern. They understand the potential strength of these adversaries and are getting ready to fight back. The old breweries of the United States, who are preparing to reopen their facilities, are also dedicated to defending their interests. Will we witness a battle of the giants? At the very least, the crooks would be well advised to take their operations elsewhere.

Nude yoga? We stretch you not

Why meditate your navel when you can do nude yoga and ponder more inspiring things instead? Take, par exemple, the luscious and limber Isabelle Monette, whose mottos include "nothing to hide." Every Saturday starting at 2 p.m., this 27-year-old health-based contortionist leads a 90-minute nude-yoga group for only $20 a crack, but you gotta reserve. Reach her at yoganumontreal@hotmail.com or ask Chimples for her number in comments. But be nice, he's possessive about blondes. As you may recall, shots were fired the last time he brought one up to the top of the old Royal Bank building.

Ground Control to Mr. Fifty!

Soon after the Soviets wowed the West by taking a lead in the space race, the Labatt Brewery came up with a publicity gimmick to capitalize on reports of the two Sputnik satellites -- clear plastic satellites of its own. Thirty of them were hung in local taverns 50 years ago this month. They were 18 inches in diamater and while the Soviets put dogs in theirs, Labatt put Mr. Fifty. If you've seen one hanging around, call us!

How to win -- and then lose -- a beautiful woman in nine easy steps

Georges Guétary, the millionaire chansonnier who wrote Ma p'tite canadienne and more memorable songs about love and stolen kisses, was in town fifty years ago to rake some lean green and hit on chicks. Here he demonstrates his technique on Iris Robin, standing in for any number of gold-digging Quebec bambinas. Unfortunately for Georges, his techique is the same crummy one that lost him Leslie Caron's on-screen affections to Gene Kelley in An American in Paris.

Iris is loosening up. All systems go.

Come play with me!

Superb! Right on key.

Now a little peck on the nape...

She's a cinch...

What? You can't leave now!

What happened to that pretty smile?

That's better. Same time tomorrow?

Next!