How Nun's Island was supposed to look

The photo above shows the original developers of Nun's Island, financiers Remer and Gewurz alongside Colin Gravenor (that's him with the 'stache) who had the idea to snag the barren island in 1956. Gravenor convinced Louis St. Laurent's government that a long-discussed new bridge should be built through the island, even though it's a longer route. The Champlain Bridge was announced just in time, as Gravenor would have been unable to make his next payment, the $100,000 after 90 days one. That's when everybody else jumped on board. They convinced Verdun to annex the island and install roads and sewers. Surely they're happy they did. 

The original plan was to construct workers' housing, a la mainland Verdun throughout the island. 

But there was construction delays, largely because my father was constantly taking legal action against everybody.
During the delay, the isle was revised to a more upscale area, so my father's litigiousness had inadverted good results. Gravenor sold his interests very early and bought a parking lot next to the Old Forum. He always wanted Nun's Island to be called Camelot, like the play.

 You'll note the Bonaventure Expressway wasn't anticipated on the original map, but the Galt Bridge, which will supposedly be built within a few years, was. Thanks to the always-gracious Gewurz family for the photos. 

Whatever happened to ol' whatshername

This woman whose name escapes me (I could look it up if required) bravely went to bat in favour of legalized prostitution for Quebec sometime in the early 90s. I know because I interviewed her and took this photo. (She clearly got dressed up for your visit. - Chimples) Her apartment had virtually no furniture, perhaps it was temporarily on loan at the pawn shop. She posed with a portrait someone had drawn of her, undoubtedly from her glorious stripper days. I wrote an uncharacteristically polished article debating the issue, almost giving her a veneer of intelligence, but alas this photo did not appear and this is the first the world is seeing of it. Wonder if she's still alive. I'm betting that she was no stranger to a crack pipe. There's a song in there somewhere waiting to be written. 

The Monster of Atwater

This bus ran up and down Atwater between 1927-1934. It was known as The Monster as it had four wheels in front and four in back. Eventually it broke in half. Found on the excellent Verdun Connections.

Montreal incomes down $5/day against average

After holding their own for long long time, Montreal incomes (the green dotted line) have spent the past couple of years plunging below the psychological differential of $5 per working day, as compared to the per capita income of the average Canadian worker.

We now make about $5.11 less per day (based on 250 working days) and take home $1,505 less than average on an annual basis.

If you want to see how dramatic the trend is becoming, just click on this interactive graph and mess around with the buttons -- especially the one that lets you see the results for the past decade. Notice how the rates of personal income between Montrealers and their national counterparts have been peeling away from each other, especially for the past three to five years.

So what's up with that?

Fun Plaza, Belmont Park

Yeeeee-haw!

The Gray Rocks Olympic connection

Gray Rocks Inn, the Laurentians ski institution that is closing its doors after 103 years (CTV news video link), has an Olympic connection. Lucile Wheeler, the first Canadian to win an Olympic medal in skiing, is the daughter of the resort's former owners, George and Lucille Wheeler. Lucile has been on skis since the age of two years. She grew up running errands between the hotel and the family home a couple of miles away, on skis for almost half of the year.

With instruction from the Gray Rocks ski coach, Herman Gadner, she started winning races -- first nearby and then around the world. This picture was taken during the 1958 World Championships at Bad Gastein in Austria, where she placed first in the downhill and slalom events. Two years earlier, she had won her Olympic medal -- a bronze -- at the VIIth Olympic Winter Games at Cortina d'Ampezzo, Italy.

Bluefest to toast four YUL icons

A quartet of Montreal legends will be honoured by Penguin Books and Blue Metropolis, as the 2009 literary festival closes up shop with a special event on April 26. The event, featuring lectures about these defunct local boys by their own Penguin biographers, will match ex-GG Adrienne Clarkson with medical superhero Norman Bethune (above).

Novelist and editor M.G. Vassanji will cover Mordecai Richler.

Margaret MacMillan, the 2003 Governor General’s Award winner for Paris 1919, will tell you what she knows about Stephen Leacock.

Finally, Governor General’s Award-winning novelist Nino Ricci will pepper his audience with tidbits about Pierre Elliott Trudeau. Rounding out the crew will be series editor and former First Husband John Ralston Saul and CBC Blue host Paul Kennedy. The festival starts April 22.

Q-Again, I won't give up until you are vanquished

This 29 year old anglo Montreal chick has just signed a contract with a big international media conglomerate that will make her lovely face and voice (big up to that Greco-Italian 80 bus inflection) familiar on all six sides of this flat planet mondo. The ink is barely dry on her impending massive-ity but you being the brainiest braintrust of the football-shaped city in the St. Lawrence surely know who she is. 

Answer: You guys are good today. This is indeed Nadia Giosia, aka Nadia G. Her website TV cooking show, Bitchin' Kitchen thingy was recently picked up by the Food Network. It is thought to be the first lifestyle program ever to be picked up from the web. It involves the aforementioned Joshua Dorsey who we praised with crazy abandon on this site a few days back.

Stop the spread of girly loincloths

Toronto news this morning (top story: wild Toronto coyote eats chihuahua) reminded Coolopolis how Torontonians are different than Montrealians. It's their obession with gender politics!

The TV said a Japanese company claims that loincloths are the next big thing for chix & will overtake panties. 

Montrealers unite! Loinclothes must not go the way of kilts. Keep them the ultimate masculine garment as exemplified in this photo. 

According to a study that will probably soon be conducted, Montreal men wear loincloths a whopping 137% more than other Canadian men.

Q-3 of today - because you're really really good! Who is speaking?

Bingo! It is indeed Guy Lafleur announcing his retirement in 1984. Excellent work readers!

Replacement Q - because you're too smart!

Brainiacs stole my thunder by raining their watery knowledge onto the last quiz, so here's the replacement quiz, what was this scene?

Yes! Everybody here is so right! It is a photo of the flood of 1987, although I don't know exactly where in Montreal it was shot.

Q-what is this photo of?

This is indeed the scene of the Laurier Palace fire that claimed 78 young lives January 9, 1927 on St. Catherine Street. There is an apocryphal tale that the fire too place during the playing of a film called Get 'Em Young. In fact, while there was a poster for such a movie, it was not playing on that day. Owner Ameen Lewand, 31, and three other Syrians were brought in for questioning.

Here's a partial list (links to with photos of the victims).

Alda Leduc (f) 16, rue Adam, injured

Gerard Robichaud 18, Alwin Street, saved a little girl. 

Eleonore Godin, 12, rue Cuvillier injured 

Gerard Poirier, 10, rue Cuvillier, injured. 

Yvette Boisseau, 8, Joliette Street, dead.

 Rene Roy, 14, Prefontaine Street, it was his birthday.

Raoul Pageau, 10, Adam Street, dead.

Antonio Menard, 12, Bourbonniere street, dead.

Rolland Germain, 11, Rouville Street, injured.

Marcel Rathe, 11, St. Germain street, dead.

Edouard Bezeau, 16, Cuvilliers Street injured.

Gaston Arpin, 6, Roubille Street, dead. 

Sylvia Quintal, 8, Joliette Street, dead.

Lucienne Decelles, 11, Lanaudiere, injured. 

Rita Maheu,7, Davidson Street, dead.

Marthe Paquin, 6, Cuvillier Street, dead.

Edouard Frechette, 12, Desery Street, Dead.

Benoit Simard, 12, Rouville street, injured.

Alexandre Bergeron, 9, Florian Street, saved by a hunch.

Roger Coulombe, 11, Alwyin Street, dead.

Jean-Paul Paquin, 10, Desery Street, dead.

Simone Marsan, 13, injured. 

Simone Seguin, 13, Lafontaine Street, dead.

Francoise Pesant, 14, Aylwin Street, dead.

Gaston St. Jean, 11, Aylwin Street, injured.

Marcel Leveasseur, 9, Darling Street, dead.

Philippe Nantel 12, Prefontaine Street, dead.

Alphonse Gadoury, 14, St. Germain Street, saved a kid.

Ernest Robichaud, 16, Aylwin Street, dead.

Fernand Come, 10, Marlbourough Street, injured.

Rene Champagne, 16, Chambly Street, dead.

Georges Stoneff, 7, Chambly Street, dead.

Raoul Girard, 9, Adam Street, dead.

Marcel Girard, 8, Joliette Street, dead.

Bernard Houde, 18, Cuvillier Street, dead.

Violette McRea, 6, Lafontaine Street, injured.

Dolores Vien, 16, Desery Street, injured.

Madeleine Guevremont, Notre Dame East, injured.

Fernande Francoeur, 14, Desery Street, injured.

Louis Gagne, 12, Davidson Street, dead.

Jeanne D'Arc Vien, 4 1/2, Desery Street, dead.

Laurette Francoeur, 16, Desery Street, injured.

Germaine Rivard, 11, Adam Street, dead.

Yvette Martel, 7, Davidson Street, dead.

Eva Martel, 8, Davidson Street, dead.

Aurea Houde, 13, Cuvillier Street, injured.

Alfred Brisson (adult, carpenter) Desery Street, helped save people.

Quiz - who said this?

Famous anglo Montreal resident once said this about the East End in the summer of 1979.

I shoot pool in a place about three blocks from here and the only English word in the place is "rack 'em." And I get along fine. I get along fine wherever I go. I'm still the same person. I haven't changed. I enjoy it here. I enjoy it alot. I have my anonymity. The beard, people started seeing it but it comes off tonight and then they won't see me and I can skate around for another few months and nobody will know me and then by that time I'll start growing antoher one. 

We have a correct reply. It is indeed Bill Lee, eccentric lefty hurler from the beloved Expos. Here's the interview. Alas the correct guesser doesn't get the cash prize because he didn't write a name or handle.

Montreal cheaper than Toronto? Think again

According to the recent 5 th annual Demographia Housing Affordability Study, Montreal's median multiple is 4.6.

Toronto's is 4.8.

What that means at a typical job in Montreal it would take you 4.6 years to pay off your typical house, as measured in medians.

Last year Montreal's median multiple was 3.9. Things got expensiver here. Cape Breton, Thunder Bay, Chatham, Windsor, Moncton were the best deals in Canuckistan.

Vancouver and Victoria were among the most unaffordable cities on the planet.

Marcel Tremblay retires

As we first predicted long ago on Coolopolis, NDG City Councillor Marcel Tremblay, also known as the mayor's brother, is quitting his municipal politics shtick to do whatever else he does. His last day at work will be on Halloween 2009. Tremblay was elected on a plan to improve access between lower NDG and the upper part and put cameras in the Melrose tunnel with a big TV monitor. That project was quickly scrapped and there is no better access between the two NDGs than there had been. He did, however, have the $4 million St. Raymond's Center built, which is a sparkling and magnificent resource that is abuzz with kids doing their homework and flinging dodgeballs. Little secret that the French school board commissioner Marie Jose Mastromonaco, who relocated from the East End, is slated to replace him as a Union candidate. She might have a useful Italian name but she's not exactly a back slapping man of the people that the NDG native Tremblay was. In fact the only time we've heard of her was when she got the blame for pulling the crossing guard out from the busy corner of Upper Lachine and Girouard. We're much keener on candidate Peter McQueen who not only has an impressive mane of red hair, but he's been poring over the dossiers closely for years and dealing with people on the ground from all levels. Tremblay quitting suggests that the upcoming road remakes involving the MUHC superhospital and the Turcot Interchange could become a major pain in the neck to the area, something he would probably not want to deal with.

Lucinda Davis fan club, get in line

We've admired Lucinda Davis since we saw her play a lesbeyond in the BTW's Lady Smith and we peeped her more recently in the Centaur's floptastic Doubt. What you might not have noticed about this local Montreal starlet on the rise is that she had a meaty role in two two-hour dramas called XIII The Conspiracy that aired on NBC in February starring Val Kilmer. Good old Val looks like he has packed on a few pounds since his marquee afternoons basking in celebratorial sunlight but Davis clearly showed up in top game shape.

Forbes spots flesh for fantasy on the Main

This release about a local restaurant was sent to us by fax in January, but Chimples ate it. And no wonder: the Forbes publishing has declared Moishe's on the Main to be one of the world's great steakhouses.

"Montreal’s Jewish community didn’t just give the world Leonard Cohen, Mordecai Richler and William Shatner; it also gave birth to this world-class steakhouse," Neil Ungerleider said of Moishe's in the Jan. 9 edition of Forbes Traveler. 

Moishe's shares top honours among the expense-account set with such restaurants as Peter Luger’s in New York, Doe’s Eat Place (various U.S. locations), Sostanza in Florence, Le Severo in Paris, Cabana Las Lilas in Buenos Aires, Gene & Georgetti in Chicago and Jess & Jim’s in Kansas City.

"The defiantly non-kosher menu (at Moishe's) offers a justifiably famous shrimp cocktail alongside the T-bones and filet mignons," Ungerleider gushed, "but side dishes like potato latkes and verenikas harken back to the old country." 

But wait -- there's more!

"Moishe’s strictly old-school staff takes reservations less than literally and more often that not guests face a long wait at the bar. Fortunately, the classic dining room and extensive wine list more than make up for the wait."

The Wal Mart on St. James Street West rumour

A longstanding persistent rumour that would see 170,000 square feet on St. James Street West transformed into a Wal-Mart has rearisen thanks to two recent commecial closures on the land, largely controled by businessman Peter Sergakis. A Dollar store is closing at the end of this month and the Picasso restaurant shut down a few weeks back.

Sergakis tells Coolopolis that the story is simply untrue. He says the Dollar Store will be transformed into an extension of PJ's, which is already very large and sometimes very full. The Amazones seems to be thriving. He says he will personally reopen the Picasso eatery within a few months. Sergakis says he's part owner of the Super C. It's doubtful that he could snap his fingers and evict the drab discount grocery store.

There are 318 Wal Marts in Canada whereas the US is home to 4,259, so we have a lower proportion of such stores given the roughly 10:1 population ratios of the countries. The typical Wal Mart measures from 51,000 to 224,000 square feet, wheras the Wal Mart Supercenters, which also sell groceries and electronics - and that's the rumoured vocation for the would-be NDG Wal-Mart - measure from 98,000 to 261,000 square feet. If all were razed, the land could accomodate such a store with parking.

The already-crazy-busy intersection at St. James and Cavendish would be further aggravated by Northbound wheeled consumers. Such a store might attract much negative attention but it could also put the feet to the fire of such stores as Best Buy who has a confortable duopoly with its sister store Futureshop.

Wal Mart has withstood a serious challenge by Target and registered a $6 billion profit in 2008.

Quiz - who is this?

This longtime Raelian quit worshipping alien sex cult spacecraft a few years ago after 20 years of being a top ranking member of the movement. His unorthodox ideas didn't stop a town in the Eastern Townships from honoring him by naming the local arena after this wacky William.

Fun-fact Hintclue: he once proposed to channel the Lachine Rapids for electricity, a proposal that was taken very seriously at the time.

UPDATE - quiz cancelled due to crushing lack of interest. The Answer, though you don't deserve it - is that it's PQ backbencher Roland Dussault who says he became a Raelian only after being voted out of office in 1985. He now has a blog denouncing the tiny perfect alien worshippers. Dussault has some sorta sports complex named in his honour in Sherbrooke.

No hibernation for local artist

Check your Coolopolis Calendar! Saturday's your last chance to check out artist Talleen Hacikyan's latest show, titled Animal Instincts, at the Alain Piroir Gallery.

Here's her bio: Born in Montreal. Played with dolls, but never owned a Barbie. In her mid-teens she lived in Geneva for two years, where she rode a motor bike, listened to Pink Floyd, and dyed all her clothes purple. Got a BA in Anthropology at McGill, had visions of becoming the next Margaret Mead. BA in Fine Arts at UQAM. Printmaker, art teacher, writer, mother of a boisterous boy, wife of an illustrious illustrator.

She also writes Talleen Hacikyan's Art Blog. Hacikyan's shows make news on the grapevine, which says something about the art in question. About 100 attended opening night earlier this month. Here's a picture of Talleen not playing accordion for Coolopolis at her December, 2006, show at the National Library which featured her painstakingly well crafted art pieces, loads of fellow gawkers, untallied quaffs of wine and memorable filo hors d'oevres.

While Saturday event is not a vernissage, you can meet the artist from 2 p.m. until close-down at 5 p.m.

The Alain Piroir Gallery is at 5333 Casgrain Street (2 blocks east of St. Lawrence, one north of Fairmount Avenue). They say if the main door is closed, your supposed to use the grey door at 5334 de Gaspé Street - right after the garage doors. How Mile-Endey.

Q- who is this?

This young anglo from the Qc countryside moved to Montreal and established his career which brought him to become a big entertainment marquee attraction in The Canadas and the U, S of A . He is pictured here visiting a home in St. Raymonds NDG.

Hint...the person who guessed Robert Goulet is is on the right track, he is indeed a musician and has made more than a few appearances on television variety shows.

Winner! We have a correct guesstimation. It is indeed Montreal's own Ronnie Prophet, born one hour west of Montreal and moved here while still young. Prophet hosted some musical variety TV shows on the CBC. He remains a big star in Nashville.

Sticker parking help psychos hunt you down

The beauty of living, if you call it that, in Canada is that you can be totally anonymous in public. Normally you don't tell total strangers where you live because it's just the safe way to go.

But the city is doing their best to betray that effort to maintain privacy.

Let's say some creepy cretin sees you driving around town in your vehicle and he somehow takes a highly unhealthy interest in you. Perhaps you don't want this pervert / psycho / loanshark or other potential aggressor knowing precisely where you sleep at night.

That person couldn't find out your whereabouts based on your license plate but there is another way.

The number written on your resident parking sticker tells prospective enemies almost precisely where you live. It wouldn't take a whole lot of research to figure that 79 is in a certain small area of lower NDG and 03 is in Old Montreal on Notre Dame East.

How to protect your normal dog from an onrushing canine beast

Last summer a tardy little douchebag on Oxford, kinda guy who got bullied as a kid and has now turned into a 30 year old idiot, kept allowing his pitbull out to run around the street and attack people. Then he would lie and claim that it simply wasnt his dog.

The neighbourhood was ready to tear this kid from limb to limb. Yet he persisted in allowing his large-jawed pooch out until an elderly Italian man got his arm almost gnawed off by the pitbull. The old man had picked up his small dog to protect him from the onrushing beast. The pitbull has since been euthanized.

So what do you do when a big dog attacks your smaller dog? Apparently its not such a rare scenario. According to the Cote St Luc website - one of the few island towns and boroughs that posts detailed descriptions of its council meetings - a pitbull recently killed a smaller dog in precisely such an incident. To quote the minutes:

Diane Jhang The resident recounted that on December 27, 2008, her mother was walking her small dog in Côte Saint-Luc which was viciously attacked by a pit bull. He (sic) then explained that shortly thereafter, her small dog was pronounced dead. She then stated that her neighbourhood is fearful because of the pit bull. Mayor Housefather explained to the resident that the police are presently handling the case appropriately and that patrolling in the area has been heightened.

I contacted local dog trainer Gaby Popper who has the following advice for those whose smaller dogs are facing attack from a larger onrushing dog.

The small dog owners instinct is to reach in there but I would say to them that using their body as a sheild between two animals that chew bones for fun is not a smart idea. Picking the small dog up makes him defenceless and is most likely to get you a masectomy that you didn’t ask for. Taking your shoe off and throwing it at him - or any such object - will separate them. That is your safest bet… making a loud noise could work too. Under no circumstances would I pick up the small dog.

And stay calm. the small dog owner usually freaks out and their stress causes the situation to erupt.

Name that businessman

He was a respected Montreal entrepreneur, a pioneer in his field, and an immigrant. Do you know who he is?

Answertime: Yes, it's Rufus Rockhead, the legendary nightclub impressario who died in 1981 at age 93. His club, Rockhead's Paradise, stood at the southeast corner of Mountain and St. Antoine (it has since burned down). 

Here's what Tommy Schnurmacher wrote about Rockhead in the Gazette back on May 15, 1987:

While some of Montreal's business families were making their first millions during the rum-running days of Prohibition, Jamaican-born Rufus Nathaniel Rockhead, a former railway porter who once ran a hat-cleaning and shoe-shine parlor in Verdun, picked up enough business savvy to obtain a tavern licence in 1928.

Rockhead's Paradise, which opened on the corner of St. Antoine and Mountain in 1930, went on to play host to many American stars including Billie Holliday, Sarah Vaughan, Redd Foxx and Sammy Davis Jr. amongst others. Even performers like Louis Armstrong and Pearl Bailey who didn't perform at the club would nonetheless drop by to pay their respects and chat with Rufus.

Although Montreal was dubbed "Sin City of the Empire" by a London Daily Mirror reporter during the post-war era, Rockhead's heated disagreements with the Duplessis regime resulted in Rockhead's being closed for most of the 1950s. Only the tavern was allowed to operate.

Rockhead's re-opened in 1961 when the provincial Liberals returned to power.In 1980, Rufus Rockhead's son, Kenny Rockhead sold the club to Boicel and Doudou's Rockhead Paradise, also known as The Rising Sun 2 featured top-name entertainment by such stars as Nina Simone, Eartha Kitt, Milt Jackson and Dizzy Gillespie. Rockhead's closed for good in 1982, one year after Rufus Rockhead died at the age of 93.

A distant mirror

Top image shows a petition from 1918 with over 200 signatures urging the unimpressive Mayor Mederic Martin to reconsider renaming Dufferin to De la Roche. It reminisces the recent and more successful initiative to prevent our bumbling Mayor from naming Park Avenue after some other guy.

This article shows that the VLT furor that has irritated Montrealers is nothing new. Over a century ago in the east end, slot machines were being discussed passionately.

Disband the Morality Squad

This impressive Montreal transvestite was shot by Colin Gravenor in the 60s, taken from JD Gravenors archives.

Colin Gravenor had a bar called the Peppermint Lounge inside the Monument National on Main Street at Dorch. People came to dance The Twist.

Gravenor owned the joint with veteran club owner Solly Silver. Eventually Gravenor bought the entire Monument Nationale building which housed the club and thus owned the famous heart of the Quebec francophonie for a short while. Many were surprised that an Englishman from England had purchased the famous building. He sold it soon after.

The Peppermint Lounge nightclub was short-lived for another reason: Gravenor refused to bribe police.

Following Gravenors refusal to pay kickbacks, the cop squad raided the Lounge repeatedly without much reason until the clientele simply stopped coming. So youve got to forgive me when I wonder why the Morality Squad will aggressively tackle some files and totally ignore others.

For example, check out this file from Laval where a bar called Champions was visited 39 times and closed down for what appear to be trivial transgressions.

As you can see from the adjacent articles, virtually every crackdown the Morality Squad initiatiates turns into a fiasco.

The squad tried to bust strippers dancing with little caps covering their nipples. A judge thought that to be a total waste of time.

They raided video store outlets but soon after it was determined that people should get to watch whatever adult dirty movies they want.
They tried to bust a club owner for having a silhouette of a girl dancing in a window. That too was a doomed waste of time.

I got a chance phone interview with a Morality Squad officer a few years back. He sounded frustrated. He admitted that the squad no longer does a whole lot and thats because nobody really wants them raiding clubs and tossing people in jail for having a good time. He spent a lot of time sitting in a cruiser doing nothing.

1992- when Montreal and Toronto were still neck and neck

Caption: Nodal structure of Southern Ontario-Quebec. The anglo influence associated with Toronto and the province of Ontario and the French allegiance to Montreal and the province of Quebec, place the cities in direct competition, each having strong ties to a distinctive hinterland.
--
Canada was once considered exceptional for having two cities roughly the same size, which is not supposed to happen, according to urban studies theory. This, of course, was prior to the disastrous 1995 referendum and other such goof ups.

According to Interpreting the City, an Urban Geography 2nd Edition by Truman A. Hartshorn, (Wiley 1992):

Canada does not have a dominant city like new York; Toronto and Montreal each account for approximately 3 million persons, creating two cities at the to of the city-size list.

This relatively unique circumstnace of having the two largest cities oth about the same size in Canada can be largely explained by the dual ethnic traditions and the settlement history of the country. The Anglo influence associated with Toronto and the province of Ontario, on the one hand, and the French allegiance to Montreal and the Province of Quebec, on the other hand, have placed the two cities in direct competition, with each drawing from its own distinct cultural economic support base and market area.

In 1862 Montreal had 90,000 residents, twice that of the biggest competitor, Quebec City.

By 1900 we were up to 500,000. Toronto only reached that in 1941.

But Montreal has been easily surpassed since. We now have about 3.6 while Toronto is up to somewhere near 5.5 million.

So much for Canada not having a dominant city.

St Patricks Day Parade Montreal mid-80z

Photo JD Gravenor

2 way traffix -- the real St. Catherine Street

Our pa shot this St. Catherine street back in '58 or so. (It's half of a stereo-mounted Kodachrome transparency, which explains the saturation, contrast, and low ASA -- i.e., slow exposure.) Notice that French predominated on the official parking signs, which must be a mirage because we know that couldn't have happened in those godforsaken days of Protestant tyranny run amok.

Here you can see four of the big theatres -- the Loews, Strand, Capitol and Palace. There were a few more beyond. Here on the left is the Agnew Surpass shoe store. Once Canada's leading footwear chain, it was started in Ontario in 1879 and closed its 223 outlets down in August, 2000.

Bring on the gwa gwas

Montrealers worry endlessly about the state of our public transit system. All agree that the MTC - (aka the Empty Seat) needs a ton more money and longer buses and new expanded funding by new taxes. Enough hand wringing and grinding of teeth to start a bush fire.

But there's a cheap solution to public transport found in hundreds of towns around the world. Most place have no money-sucking MTC-style bus bureaucracy. They simply allow 12 seat vans with two guys to drive up and down the same street all day picking up anybody waiting on the curb. This transport doesn't cost taxpayers and provides efficient service and cheap lifts for those willing to get up occasionally if your neighbour wants to get off.

In the Dominican Republic they're known as gwa-gwas, in Grenada if you hop on one you're 'pulling bull' and pretty much every other town and city from Morocco to the Maldives considers such unimposing roadside van pickups entirely routine.

In Montreal big unions and their police allies would crush you like a bug if you ever tried to set up such a service. As Spacing Montreal reported, a shuttle bus initiative was shut down last year for no discernable reason.

Only exception is Habitat 67, which offers shuttle bus to the McGill metro. (BTW, anybody who thinks that local real estate is on the skids, take a look at the price tag for this Habitat unit which would have sold for about $100-150 k a decade ago).

Allowing a few gwa-gwas onto the streets of Montreal could only help the city. There's no legitimate argument against them. They drive so slow that they wouldn't endanger anybody but the MTC's inflated budget.

Around 250 more days until city elections

For some reason Louise O’Sullivan, a former downtown city councillor cultivated and then spat out by Mayor Tremblay, is running for Mayor of Montreal. If nothing else, she sure writes a spicy little press release. Her most recent missive, denouncing Tremblay for those lunatic anti police riots, uses such neat-o terminology as "abhor, hooliganism, loose-cannons, blundering and pathetic." As in: "We abhor police brutality and equally abhor uncontrolled vandalism and hooliganism in our city.” Good thing she clarified that. Voters should know whether is for or against those things.

Meanwhile current downtown city councillor you've likely ne'er heard of, Karim Boulos, represents the old Bourque team, known as Vision. That party is led shakily by a guy named Benoit Labonte, who is apparently very shy. They aren't doing too well in the polls. Boulos, a serious brainiaque former swim coach, spun heads with his wizardry at the Concordia MBA program and has served ably as city councillor in an area where a staggering number of his predecessors have failed. Boulos, an empathetic and entertaining communicator might be the brightest mind in city hall, he'd make a kick-ass mayor. Here's his blog.

Pop Art TV ad for CBC Mtl 1961

So I'm like...hey..what's up with that?

Building just south (err, actually North, as a reader pointed out) of City Hall getting gutted, a rather spectacular sight in the area. Did I miss the memo? Seemed like a perfectly good building from the outside. Anybody got the heads up?

No Parking either March or April 1...or something

A: Because the City of Montreal wants to freaque its people out with surrealist mind-bending instructions. Q: Why does one end of the zone order no parking from March and the other end no parking from April?

Joshua Dorsey's The Point - The Greatest Movie of All Time

A year or so ago, a small gang of filmmakers recruited half of all the anglo youth in Point St. Charles and got them into a gritty flick about life in the area. One boy rides around selling drugs for toughs. Another stoner is trying to free the rats. One gang of girls bullies another gang. Kids play a basketball game to decide who gets to control the court. One girl is a drug addict. Another girl is depressed. One gang of chicks spray paints abandoned buildings. One academically gifted star basketball player gets yelled at by his ma and led astray by locals. Kids routinely get mistreated by local police. Oh and there's a ghost. And a child molester. And three boys who hang around, one of whom realizes that his false testimony put an innocent man in jail for the murder of a local kid. They jam all this into one little movie starring amateur actors, some of whom are quite good, some who are quite bad. Pure anglodom, the closest the film comes to evidence of French in Montreal is a cop with a bit of an accent. As you watch, you can play guess the location. I was like: hey, that's just around the corner from Club Price and hey that's exactly where my Venture broke down last summer. The film ends with a scene at Mountain and William, a corner they cite like three times for no discernable reason. If it's actually shot there in the Griff you can't tell. The only death in the movie happens there and it's not exactly clear what happened, but you won't worry about the movie quickly shifts to one of the many other characters that you've come to love. Overall an impressive bit of filmmaking to incorporate so many characters and storylines into such a small canvas.

Tremblant scene of actress Richardson's mishap

This is one of the bunny runs at Mont Tremblant, where actress Natasha Richardson fell and injured herself today. Here's a link to a video that gives you an idea of what it's like up there. Here are the Tremblant webcams. (L.A. Times unconfirmed report says she is on life support in the U.S. after receiving treatment in Montreal.)

The Rolling Stones on St. James Street West

Here`s a photo of a bunch of kids from St. Raymonds NDG standing alongside Rolling Stones Brian Jones, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger in April 1965. Great photo. I will reveal the entire photo and the rather interesting anecdote around the visit as soon as one reader donates $50 to the NDG Food Bank, proof required.

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Everybody bow down and thank Ken Monteith who has stepped up and slapped a fifty on the table for charity to allow you to witness this iconic Montreal image.

The following photo and story courtesy of the excellent Peter Ponzi, longtime resident of St. Raymonds, the southern section of NDG.

It was 1965. The Stones were in town and high on the charts with The Last Time. One Saturday in April Peter Ponzi was just hanging around the house in southern NDG. Peter's older brother Italo came to the porch reporting that there was some band at the gas station nearby on St. James and Regent (across from D&G Hardware). The previous night the Rolling Stones had performed in Montreal and were en route to Ottawa with two Station Wagons. Thus Brian Jones, Keith Richards and Mick Jagger were just hanging out in NDG. Bill and Charlie were had already gone ahead towing a U-Haul.

Brian, Keith and Mick had stopped at Mr. Andreoli's garage to get a new side mirror installed.

One of the kids had taken a few photos and Peter rushed back home to get his Kodak but in his haste he banged it against a car. Ponzi shot the last three photos on the roll but to his disappointment, he later saw that they had come out black (painted black? - Chimples).

Mick went into the car to snooze while Keith kept leaning against the door chatting with the local youth but Brian asked about the St. James escarpment. He said it looked like a cliff edge. The kids said that it wasn't actually a cliff but a hill with a train depot below. Brian crossed to see and almost got hit by a car, as he was unused to cars driving on the wrong side of the street.

Brian was quie excited at the steam trains below. It seemed he collected models and made films of them as a hobby. The trains were getting their water tanks filled and Brian filmed the scene with a movie camera with fascination, remarking on how much smaller the English steamers were.

The three rockers eventually left and the kids had a hot story to tell at school on Monday. Years later Peter found the girl in the red top who had taken the photos (I believe she now works at the NDG Food Bank) and she gave him a copy of the photo. The Stones themselves were shown the photo when they came to Montreal in 1998. Mick showed it to Keith but somehow they never actually autographed it.

It's been 48 since Boom Boom's 50

As the Universite de Sherbrooke's Bilan du Siecle website points out, it was on this date in 1961 that Bernie "Boom Boom" Geffrion equaled Rocket Richard's record 50 season goals. It took Geffrion 64 games to do what Richard did in 50 games sixteen years before. Also on this day, work began on Bell Canada's Beaver Hall Hill HQ in 1928.

Otakuthon coming; F1 still isn't

O.K., so Montreal has lost its share of world-class attractions to spice up its summer nights. Now the good news: the Otakuthon is new in town, or back, whatever it is. And here's a cool Guy/St. Kate map the folks put together.

Blessed Are They at St. James United - 3 more shows

Take some time and $20 to check out one of the final three performances (8 pm tonight & tmrw and 2 pm Sunday) of Blessed Are They, directed by local theatre vet Guy Sprung at the very neat venue of the St James United Church. It stars the always-excellent Andreas Apergis as a minister with ugly glasses struggling to keep his small church afloat with the support of his sane yet delectably supportive and frisky wife played by Juno Mills-Cockell. She's also very good, I'd like to see more of her. When a reformed sinner (Eric Davis) comes along and grows the congregation with some zealotry, the minister has to make a decision. The script forces the audience to think, which isn't my favourite activity but it's a rewarding and entertaining experience. I met many of the cast members after the play - including the excellent Vlasta Vrana. They're all dedicated local actors who put a lot of care in their craft.

Nespresso hits the strip

Chimples, who was serving the appetizers, didn't see George Clooney at the opener, but the new Nespresso boutique on Crescent St. might look sorta like this. It's good to have a coffee after clubbing, but unfortunately it keeps store hours, because that's what it is. Nespresso is this gourmet coffee system that uses disposable coffee cartridges. The machine makes a near-perfect froth, the coffee is good and you pay for what you get.

Montreal stuff.

Ambulance taxis: You want to go downtown but can't afford a taxi. Many just call an ambulance and they'll give you a free ride to the hospital of your choice, whereupon you can scoot on down to wherever you want to go. Ambulances officials have confessed that moochers often feign illness just for the lift.

Arson: There is said to be a list of 22,000 people trying to get a city subsidized apartment in Montreal. You know the deal, taxpayers are squeezed so some random poor folk can get their rent paid on your dime. There is a way to get immediately to the front of the line. If your apartment happens to go up in flames, the city will get you into one of these places very quickly, whereupon you'll be allowed to stay for life providing you cough up one quarter of your monthly income. One day someone will torch his own apartment building just to get in such a place.

Scalping: An old school St. Urbain street type Jewish gentleman has spent his life scalping hockey tickets outside the Forum and the building which replaced it. The fellow is so scared of being nailed for tax or other legal purposes that he owns no identification and has never benefitted from any of Canada's social programs.

Longest air shipment: In 1941 the record largest air shipment started in Montreal. 500 pounds of wool felt was carried 18,000 miles to Calcutta, stopping in SF and China. (source: Popular Science June 1941, p. 43)

Dog racing: Montreal, once upon a time, apparently had dog racing. According to one source it was here in 1928. I've not seen primary source material confirming other details. I once came across an article announcing that five would be launched that year but never saw anything else about it. The Montreal dog races saw the introduction of pari mutuel betting in North America.

Unhappy home: The house at the northeast corner of Westmount and Roslyn was put on the market not long ago. The wealthy elderly professional who lived there committed a murder/suicide, his wife being the victim.

New Caisse Boss

The Caisse de Depot, the massive pension fund for Quebec, the big staple of Quebec Inc and Quebec Sait Faire-ism, has screwed up beyond all comprehension, losing more money than can rationally be explained by any measure. So they obviously needed a new boss. They got one today, in the form of Robert Tessier.

The person in the photo is Robert Tessier.

Fairview Mall XBox orgy Thurs-Sun

Video games and malls. Not exactly high culture but hey we gotta get through the week, don't we and we're still avoiding the opera because we're not keen on cummerbunds.

So from Thursday to Sunday the Fairview Mall is hosting a big XBox Festival with all sorts of games laid out to be played and prizes and so forth.

Kids and fogeys will be invited to enjoy games like Rock Band 2, Scene It! Box Office Smash, You’re In The Movies and Lips.

There will be prizes and other stuff.

First Habs in helmets - a Depression-era fiasco

Much has been said about Jacques Plante being the first NHL goalie to wear a mask..but what about Habs in helmets? You might've imagined that JC Tremblay was the first to wear the exoskeleton but in fact Johnny Gagnon and Armand Mondou of the Canadiens were the first locals to strap on the cranial protection in 1934. It didn't last long, however, as the February 1935 Popular Science clip indicates. These weren't the first in the NHL to don gear. At least one player on another team had worn a leather football helmet about five years earlier.

Anglo Quebec gets play in US comedy

Rare is a big release mainstream American comedy starring a Quebecker as a central character. Rarer still is one that features an anglo Quebecker.

In last summer's The Promotion Richard Wehlner, played by the excellent John C. Reilly, displays a variety of apparently anglo-Quebec cultural pecadilloes, including a slight Maritimes-sounding lilt.

So central was the anglo-Quebec thing that the film bore the working title Quebec, USA as written by Chicago-resident Steven Conrad, who still thinks of it by that name.

In one scene Wehlner escapes reprimand for allowing a grocery store colleague to post a derisive poster about "cutting the cheese." Wehlner claims, obviously improvising, that in Canada we say "cracking the cheese." Wehlner is competing for a managerial post and his nemesis admits that he has a major challenge because Canadians "are very nice."

The anglo Quebecker, alas, has replaced his drug and alcohol consumption issues with inspirational tapes. It doesn't fully work.

The only apparent flaw is that Wehlner's car has Quebec plates in the front.

Why Brits don't move to Canada

Here's why it's difficult to move to Canada if you're an older British citizen. If you are a British pensioner the UK is happy as beans to mail your pension cheque to you wherever you are in the world. But they will index the pensions to certain places and not to others. Canada, Australia, South Africa and others are among the places where your pension payments will never rise, wheras Spain and other such places will see your cheques get bumped up year after year. A slew of lawsuits and lobbying and other techniques have failed to budge the Brits to become more generous with their Commonwealth emigres. So if you're a Brit moving here, you might think twice knowing that your parents would never consider following you over. I'd urge people to sign a petition or something but nothing seems to have worked yet and at this point there's little hope of changing a thing.

Montreal's Beautification Week - now sadly a thing of the past

On May 20, 1955 a 20 float parade, featuring college bands, gymnasts, beauty queens and another 20 limousines was launched at Lafontaine Park and ended up at Atwater and Sherbrooke. The parade was the first such procession since 1949 and was considerably larger than its predecessor. The event ended the city's Beautification Week, which was an annual event thattook place in Montreal for decades, fizzling out sometime in the 1970s. (see accompanying fuzzy photos of the fizzy festivities).

The celebrations were designed to encourage public participation in cleanliness. They included such events as the awarding of the Golden Garbage Pail. Four Montrealers bagged the Golden Pail in 1962, including John Mishkin of 6200 Clanranald.

Other yeards you'd get Mayor Drapeau sweeping the street in a photo-op with clowns (as in the photo above).

And various Montrealers would be cited for keeping their stores or houses clean, the facade, the flowers, and so forth... all in an effort to cultivate a sense of civic pride in the cleanliness of the city.

So... um... the event takes a rather interesting twist in 1965 when Mayor Drapeau got the idea of taking all the junk lying around and bringing it to the empty lot where the CBC building would eventually be built.
Once all the old chairs, hairbrushes, and other stuff that might be considered valuable antiques today were heaped into a massive pile, Drapeau personally fired up the sucker and watched it burn. It was billed as the city's biggest bonfire. Drapeau went on to lead the massive garbage burning ceremony again the next year.

Beautification Week took place just prior to Victoria Day, which suggests that the traditional illicit burning of old mattress and other junk in Point St. Charles on Victoria Day might have been considered by some as a noble civic gesture.

Beautification Week disappeared from the local press sometime in the 70s. The city no longer encouraged people to involve themselves in cleaning up public places, as this was now the domain of the unionized city workers who regarded such lucrative tasks as their own biz.

Who's that girl?

This one's pretty easy, if you can reel in a few years.

Stumped? Here,s a clue: The photographer got to see more than her face -- and so did a lot of other people.

Time's up: No winners today. It is, of course, Waneek Horn-Miller, the former Canadian Olympic water polo team member who sparked one of several controversies by taking off her clothes for Time magazine in 2000. Daughter of a Mohawk activist, she has ties to the South Shore Kahnawake Indian reserve (She is verrrry nice - Chimples).

Down memory lane with Life pictures

The Google archive of Life Magazine pictures has gone live. Here are the Montreal ones.

Interactive film made '67 debut in MTL

Billing itself the first-ever "interactive movie," Kinoautomat was one of the most popular attractions at one of the most popular pavilions at one of the most popular events of all time, Expo 67.

It was the summer before Soviet tanks would roll into Czechoslovakia, but who knew? The wee Central European country was in Montreal to impress the more than 50 million visitors who came here from every corner of the globe. And it did: the Czechoslovak pavilion was a sensation. It wound up in the Top 5 by attendance:

1. U.S.S.R. - 13 million
2. Canada - 11 million
3. United States - 9 million
4. France - 8.5 million
5. Czechoslavakia - 8 million

Put it this way, the eight million visitors to the Czechoslovak pavilion represented about two times the entire population of Czechoslovakia at the time.

People lined up for three hours to gain entry. They came out not only for the sizzling sausages and can't-get-that-here Pilsner, but for the buzz surrounding a once-in-a-lifetime chance to gander at a luscious spread of historic Baroque art, royal treasures, a children's wonderland, cutting-edge manufacturing and design -- and, not least, a first-hand view of the kind of experimental cinema for which cinema critics were then swooning.


Kinoautomat (sometimes known as Kino-Automat) introduced a never-before-seen concept in audience participation. For each screening, a crowd would pack the 125-seat cinema to view a new kind of black comedy, which was interrupted at regular intervals by actors from the film itself. With the house lights up, these actors each took a turn to ask the audience to vote between two possible outcomes at each stage of the plot.

Audience members then voted by hitting a red or green button in front of them. When the lights went back out, the film continued along the lines of the audience vote. There were about 20 of these interruptions during the film which ran just over an hour.

The technology behind the interactive cinema process was ingenious but simple. It worked by means of a pair of projectors, which an operator would synchronize to display only those scenes that the audience had democratically endorsed.

People loved that voting stuff. But things were changing back home, where Czechoslovak authorities were under significant Soviet pressure. The idea of people voting for any kind of change was pretty much verboten! (I think you mean 'Запрещается' - Chimples).

The film wouldn't be screened back home for another four years, and then only sparingly. After 40 years, Kinoautomat was finally screened to big hoopla in Prague in 2007.

So what ever happened to interactive cinema? The technique evolved into an approach to early digital video gaming for consoles based on laser-disc technology.

Here's a 1998 conversation with Dr. Raduz Cincera. Kinoautomat was his brainchild.

Finally, if you happen to be in Newcastle, England, this coming Thursday (March 5, 2009), you can catch a screening (er, performance) of Kinoautomat at the Pixel Palace.

Coolest car ever - for Montreal anywayz

This early 70s vehicular version of hockey great Jean Beliveau - complete with a 4 near the back and the C at the front - must've really brought attention to Le Gros Bil when he motored around our Pine Rapids Island City in the early 70s. As a kid, I worked at the parking lot where Beliveau parked, ie: around 1977 - 80 and recall that the esteemed retired hockey great wheeled around in something far more traditional, probably a Continenal. Beliveau was a saint. He'd sometimes park next to PA announcer Claude Mouton whose ego was bigger than his Cadillac Seville, which he once had me watch with the Stanley Cup inside the trunk. Mouton died of cancer soon after but thankfully Beliveau has still yet to lace them up in Elysium.

NFL's long..well not so long..history in Montreal

The NFL has played at least three exhibition games in Montreal. The first pitted the Boston Patriots (now known as the New England Patriots) against the Detroit Lions at Jarry Park. It attracted 8,212 people.

The Second took place at the Olympic Stadium under the name "The American Bowl" on August 9, 1990 and featured the New England Patriots versus the Pittsburgh Steelers. I have the game programs for both of these games. None too electrifying.

There was another game at the Olympic Stadium on August 5, 1988, the New York Jets beat the Cleveland Browns 11-8.

I suppose this means that Montreal is probably supposed to cheer for the Patriots considering that they've played more games here than any other team.

The Assumption of Empire - don't be a fool! Don't miss out!

It's written by an esteemed Montreal penner. It is also set right here in beloved city of Pine Rapids. It features the Mad Englishman Tim Hine, who in his creaky dotage once pedalled an rusty old bike daily for three weeks from Lasalle to Laval just to rehearse for a play.

So the very least you can do is to get over to the Mainline Theatre starting Tuesday to witness this tale of Sophie Wiseman, who tries to figure out how all of her good intentions failed to improve the world.

The play'll cost you a $20 that you would have otherwise wasted on something far less worth and it goes on from March 3- March 22 at the Mainline Theatre, somewhere up near Schwartz on the Main.

Fast track Icelandic Immigration to Quebec!

Iceland has been hit hard by the recent economic disaster and is in perhaps its worst shape since its great killer volcano eruption of 1873. There's the chance of starvation, burning old wood antiques for heat, eating ponies and so forth. No kidding. Many of these fine citizens are thinking of moving away and places such as Manitoba have opted to fast-track the entry of Icelanders into Canada. It's time for Yolande James and Quebec provincial Liberal government of Jean Charest to show an even higher level of concern and up the humanitarian offer to these people, who come from a deeply civilized society with low levels of crime, high levels of education and who are one of the founding settlers of Canada. Quebec has a shamefully small Icelandic population. We could learn much from the Icelanders, and as well, they are a great looking breed, the same endagered species of blonde-blue eyed people whose genetic qualities -without our help - could become extinct with a few generations. For all the right reasons it's time to extend a helping hand to Icelanders who seek a nice life in Canada.