Coolopolis course on Montreal history begins Feb. 6 ! Sign up now!

 
   Vanier College will be the magical spot starting February 6, 2017 for the first-ever adult-ed history course taught by no other than myself,
   It's a 30-week no-credit, no-homework affair that will give you a perspective and insight into an offbeat Montreal that your neighbour with the fancy car can only dream of having.
   Sign uphere.
   Courses are Mondays and Wednesdays at 6 30 pm at Vanier. See you there!
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Meanwhile for your infotainment pleasure here are some spots around Montreal that have an interesting past.

1420 Towers apartment 512. German Gerda Munsinger's mistake was to put two  cabinet ministers as references on how application for Canadian citizenship. She knew them both in a personal way, not that there's anything wrong with that. Gerda started out as a nanny in hicksville before moving to Montreal and hauling tray at the Chick'n'Coop. She got around to such places as the Chez Paree and Ruby Foos and might have accepted the occasional tip for her intimate charms. The Liberals were hoping to scare up a Profumo-type scandal here in Canada so they hyped up a notion that Gerda was a honey pot passing information to Soviets, as she was also familiar with gangster Willie Obront, who worked for the Mafia. Indeed Obront and his chauffeur Robitaille wandered around this very building bugging neighbours about her at one point. She moved back to Germany and sold her story to all scribes who were willing to pony up, so suddenly the splashiness was splashing, as all sides had an interest in hyping the scandal, except the poor Diefenbaker Conservatives. Anybody who shopped for bell peppers at the now-extinct Provigo on St. Cat near Fort will have seen this building behind. It was described as being posh but nowadays it looks pretty rundown.

  19 Cressy in Hampstead was the home of Willie Obront in the early 1970s before he moved to Florida around 1975. Obront was a butcher by trade who laundered massive amounts of Mafia cash and was eventually nabbed in the states in connection with a dopey fake Quaalude ring. He was the personification of what was sometimes called the Jewish Mafia. He might still be alive in Florida, if so he'd be in his 90s.


3270 Jean Talon E.was known as the J.J. Bar on 38 June 1985 when Pierre Paul Poulin,, 37, shot Yves Andre Carpentier, 33 and Jacques Van Meerbeeck, 25, with whom he had likely been making a minor drug transaction. He also gunned down manager Jean Claude Samson and waitress Manon Lariviere, 27, who was on her first night. She was probably killed for being a witness. Poulin was excited to hear a radio report on the affair the next day and insisted on returning to see people milling around outside. He was only caught in 1989 as his wife soured on him after he threatened to kill their daughter. Sophie Saint Marseille was just 16 when she was working at the bar as a dancer and was going out with him at the time of the shooting. She kept her mouth shut. Poulin also confessed the grisly quadruple slaying to his cocaine dealer


 4750 Ontario Conrad Bouchard enjoyed pretty much his last days of freedom at this building just west of Viau, although how free do you feel when being hunted by cops? Bouchard endeared himself to Italian mobsters by singing opera in downtown nightclubs and became known as the king of heroin after befriending mob boss Louis Greco. Bouchard took part in a few massive bank robberies and major frauds. He was busted at apartment 407 of this apartment in building on July 31, 1981. Downstairs neighbour Rolland Emond's apartment 103 contained a massive stash of cocaine and PCP. Bouchard had the key. He had been given two life sentences for heroin importation in 1974 and was also previously nailed for forging six cent stamps. At the time of this bust Bouchard was only out of prison because he had escaped custody on a supervised dinner date with his wife. Bouchard was sentenced to 24 years for importing cocaine a few years later. He died of cancer in 1995 at the age of 65.

3666 St. DenisThe Rajastan restaurant was, for decades, home to the Fontaine de Johannie which author Dany Laferriere described in his breakout novel as "a roach ridden restaurant frequented by small time hoods." A decade before Laferriere moved in next door, the spot was where Jacques Morin and Jean Claude Arbour, both aged 27, were gunned down at 2:45 a.m. on July 21 1974, in as an early moment in the Great Meth War of 1975, which saw dozens die following infighting among the Devils Disciples gang. We're not sure if the building is new or has just been rebricked. The La Presse newspaper devoted a big 30 words to the double-slaying.


20 Metropolitain E. Angelo Lanzo was a top lieutenant in the early 1970s Montreal Mafia, as he was trusted by Paolo Violi and Frank Cotroni. But he really was not into testifying at the crime commission. So when ordered to attend, he attempted to fight it in court and then he simply went underground, renting an apartment near Highway 40. It was just his little flop house as he didn't even have a TV in there when he was found dead of heart failure one week after moving in at the age of 46 on May 21, 1974. Lanzo didn't have much of a criminal record but he had been busted for having a gambling house in 1952. He was the top assistant of Nick Di Iorio and was closely associated with Vic Cotroni, Willie Obront and even knew Joe Bannano. (La Presse in its reporting of the address might have been confounded with 4520 Cremazie which seems like a likelier spot for him to have been living, so if that's the case here is the more accurate image).