What happened to all those forgotten businesses?

Whatever happened to TV Rental joints, Chinese laundries, jean boutiques? Here's the answer.

Montreal was once haircut heaven. Sixty years ago, you could sit yourself at Eddy's, Sam's or Irvin's Sanitary Barbershop, among the 800 barber shops in a city about a third the size it is today.

But our local men's barber supply was soon dramatically cut. Between 1937 and 1948 one of out of three Montreal barbers had packed up their chairs, according to the local Lovell's business directory. By 1957, 400 barber poles still turned in this town, half the number of a decade before.

The decline of the rotating tricolour barber cylinder is just one of countless tales of the rise and fall of local business told by Montreal's listings sources like Lovell's. Since the first bricks and mortar hit our muddy soil, entrepreneurs have been trying to make a buck with a killer concept.

Some businesses grew steadily. Bowling alleys rolled along smoothly with the growth of the city. In 1920, Montreal had four bowling alleys. By 1937, we had 19, and double that in 1947. By 1957, Montrealers could choose from 41 places to lace up their bowling shoes, including Bowl-A-Way, Bowl-O-Dram and the Bowlorium. Nowadays, there's about 70, according to Yellow Pages listings.

But for every retail, service or recreational idea that gains popularity through the decades, many others fall by the way. One streetscape favourite for sidewalk loiterers was the TV rental shop, presumably for those who weren't sure if they liked television enough to buy one.

In 1987, the local pages featured 25 TV rental listings, including Rentevision, which could lease TVs up to 28 inches. By the mid-'90s, the total had crumbled to a mere seven TV rental outlets, a total that has remained steady since.

Perhaps no more dramatic local rise and retail fall has been experienced than by the Chinese laundry. The city's first opened in 1870 and by 1922, 408 dotted the city. By 1939, the total had slipped to 336; in 1949, we had 231 and by 1964, there remained a mere 145. Now a single one is still operating, on Décarie. Don't lose your ticket.

Many retail entrepreneurs sniff out the next big thing. Unfortunately, competitors have noses too.

So if you shut down your moribund hat store and opened up a jean store in the '70s you were a jeans genius. In 1977, our Yellow Pages suddenly had two full pages of jeans stores, including fledgling denim empires Jean Junction, with a dozen stores, Sirois Jeans with seven and Sweet Jeans with five.

A decade later, those empires had crumbled and the city's 100 jeans stores were now dominated by Bo Jeans with 11 outlets, Pantorama with nine and the always hardworking Jean Bec on Jarry.

By the mid-'90s economic doldrums - an era where business directory listings had thinned considerably - the jeans shop was singing the blues. Three-quarters of those stores had disappeared from the Yellow Pages. Pantorama was down to two outlets and Bo Jeans had just one.

The ink in the directory pages argues that the '80s were more fun than the '90s. Thirteen singing or dancing telegrams outlets existed here during the '80s. We had 54 amusement centres ready to drain your quarters and escort agencies had made their entry into the local phone book. Dance studios grabbed a full page in the book with such optimistic names as Dance World of Tomorrow and Transe en Danse.

A decade later dance studios were whittled down to sad few, all with more sober names. The economic slowdown also took a toll on restaurant listings, boiling them down to 11 pages in 1996 from 17 in 1987. Luckily, the singing telegram industry was still going strong.

Tattoo parlours were surprisingly rare during the years when sailors were still roaming the Main. A 1969, newspaper article from the local weekly La Patrie reported the demise of the city's only tattoo parlour, Prof Clément's joint on St. Laurent Blvd. It had reportedly been the city's only such establishment since 1959. Tats were described as a gimmick that peaked in 1955 when the Rose Tattoo, starring Burt Lancaster, inspired Montreal women to get inky flowers on shoulders. Nowadays, 411.ca shows a couple of dozen such joints, including a slew on Ontario St. alone.

Publicly advertised escorts and naughty massage parlours were unheard of throughout most of the city's past and for good reason - jail time. Norman Dezoice, 33, was sentenced to 10 years in jail in 1964 for operating such places. Richard "Ziggy" Wiseman, who ran 17 massage parlours, got 41/2 years in jail in 1977 - in truth he was sentenced for trying to bribe a cop to hush up the sexual thrills offered at his places.

Wiseman killed himself in prison. Nowadays, massage signs brazenly hang over so many storefronts that they seem bigger than dépanneurs. The 411.ca listings alone report 60 massage parlours along with 60 escort services.

The old directories offer myriad insights about our economic and social evolution. For example, Montreal got sick of the piano after the war. Two hundred piano teachers listed their services here in 1947. A decade later, there were only 85.

But mostly the listings prove that for every Schwartz's or The Bay that has lasted through the decades, Montreal has countless businesses that staggered through a couple of winters before going the way of the corset shop and the pager boutique.

Kristian Gravenor is a Montreal freelance writer.


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