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Crosses on Ridgewood
Funny little detail about the buildings at the top of Ridgewood Ave in Cote des Neiges: when they were built, in 1955-1956, they were designed to form the shape of a cross from above. So, in fact,...
View ArticlePhil Everly's famous friendship with Buddy Holly - forged in Montreal
The recently-deceased early-days-of-rock legend Phil Everly describes how he first met Buddy Holly in the Montreal Canadiens' locker room at the old Forum in 1957. It would be an epic friendship -...
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Now that's a car crash
Back in the days when Lorne Greene was the voice of all of the Canadas and neighbouring housewives used to ring your doorbell to borrow eggs and sugar, Montreal had a lot of streets that have since...
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Palais de Concrete and its mysterious gas leaks
Downtown resident Madame Arthur Lafontaine of 960 Chenneville Ave. in Montreal was hospitalized several times for a mysterious series of gas inhalation incidents between 1951 and 1956. Authorities...
View ArticleWhy the shot-in-Montreal series Radisson - aka Tomahawk - flopped
Radisson, or Tomahawk: The Adventures of Pierre Raidsson, was one of the earliest-ever Canadian TV series and it was filmed right here in Montreal. The CBC production - filmed in such exotic Canadian...
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Montreal's Jewish Defence League in training, 1970
Hate to terrify you this early in the morning but these fierce young warriors used to roam the streets of this very city in 1970, as part of a squad of 300 fighting to protect the Jewish people....
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Where are they now? Sir George Williams protester dies in Trinidad
Belgrave Perhaps worth nothing that a central figure in one of the city's most famous riots, Ian Belgrave, died in July. The militant Trinidad-based mathematics teacher and steel pan lover, better...
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Early days of Montreal's motorized taxis
Montrealer Mario Pompetti shared this photo of his father, a cabbie in the early days of motorized taxis. He says it was taken in the 1930s in Montreal but I can't determine exactly where, as the name...
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Summer of '70: Toronto air disaster kills 64 Montrealers
Top row: Mrs. Boosamra and her daughter Lynn Boosamra, Mrs. R. Poirier, Mrs. Weinberg and daughters Carla and Wendy, Mark Simon, Mrs. and Mrs. Gustave Waitz. Second row: Gaetan Beaudin, Claude Holiday,...
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Snow sculptures in the city
Would love to know the backstory about this snow sculpture on a 1987 postcard, somewhere in Montreal.
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Cyber-savvy Mayor Coderre earns online fail
Montreal's new mayor is unlike other politicians of the folksy-portly breed, in that his thing is being lightning quick with his internet accounts. Coderre is prolific on Twitter where some have...
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1951: teen goes undercover for 4 years, busts Montreal Communists
Maurice Boyzcum was a widely-feted anti-Communist infiltrator who spied on the Reds for four years, starting at age 15, in a mission that ended in many busts. Boyzcum quit the Boy Scouts and joined...
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Quebec's costly deal to rent offices on the Lower Main
Photoshop collage of Christian Yaccarini and J.F. Lisee The province has finally achieved its obscure goal of occupying the Lower Main, as on December 2 Quebec inked a costly deal to relocate many...
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Newly-discovered old pic of bus station on Dorch
Contributor MP & I sent this photo of the old PTC Terminal on Dorchester near Drummond taken by his grandfather in the 1930s. It's the best pic I've seen of the site, which was demolished and...
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Sad photo of the day - Montreal's once-glorious rooftop pool
Painfully cold days of winter used to be the time for Montrealers to start dreaming of summertime urban delights such as sipping beer at baseball games and sipping beer poolside in such joints as...
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Skyscrapers will make downtown Montreal windier and colder
Montreal's skyline - as seen in this composite image by Cadillac Fairview including future projects - is growing fast, as the area around Dorch fills up, following the same trend that hit de...
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Cuban horses at Blue Bonnets
After we ran photos of the dystopian hell that onetime glorious Blue Bonnets has fallen into lately, we feel obliged to run these pics of happier times at the track, kindly sent along to us at the...
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Little shacks with big setbacks
Imagine your house being so awkwardly conceived that whenever you make the long trek from the sidewalk to your front door bear-hugging a Steinberg's paper bag laden with Miracle Whip and Twinkies, you...
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Black history to be wiped out with demolition on St. Antoine
The old building across from the Bell Centre on St. Antoine W. is going to be demolished to be replaced by a new condo development and that's sad because 1180 was a useful space for practicing...
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The West Island teen locked up for skipping school
Erika Tafel Erika Tafel was not your typical teen behind bars. She came from a middle class nuclear family with two brothers and professional parents on the West Island and has never, to this day,...
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