When Trudeau Airport was a racetrack

   Montreal's bustling Trudeau Airport was a race track complete with thoroughbred races on a half-mile track in its previous incarnation. It was launched by owner Samuel Holman in 1914 and he died at age 73, in Haverhill Mass. in 1941, the same year it was conceived to be repurposed as Montreal's city airport.
   About 50 trains would bring people a day to the track, at least according to the plans written up in 1912 and the track would be an imitation of the Terrazas Race Track in Juarez Mexico, so we can assume it looked like the photo accompanying these words.
   The track suffered money woes and eventually closed in the mid-30s although there were frequently-discussed plans to reopen it.
   Someone named Sir William Hildred came to the site in 1941 and organized its purchase for a future airport for the price of $1,000,000. The war effort had made the matter a bit more urgent and the Saint Hubert facilities were considered less alluring.
 What else do we know about the Dorval Race Track? In 1915 it was taking in about $89,000 a day in bets, roughly the same as the Blue Bonnets course, but much less than the Mount Royal half-mile track, which was raking in $300,000.
  Few big newsworthy events took place at the course - Holman was threatened by an assassin in 1915, a man was found dead of natural causes there in 1938, two women were seen bringing a child in but leaving without that same child in 1939, Old Bones, the Kentucky Derby champ of 1918 ran his last-ever race at Dorval , there was a kerfuffle over a possible sale of the property to turn it into a military barracks in 1914, Canadiens' owner Leo Dandurand owned the track in the 1930s and its sale became a drawn-out process in 1937 due to legal reasons.
   We're hoping that someone can turn up some photos of the owner, the horses, the track and so forth.
   If you have any ideas, please let us know.