Urban Overexposure - How to cope with the psychological pressure of strangers
Each of those thousands of people you see around town requires a quick evaluation: should I be scared? Is it someone I know? Should I nod or smile? Are her boots more expensive than mine?...
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Searching for André, hero who saved baby from downtown Montreal blaze
Marcia Smith, aka Marcia Eleccion, was a single mother of two working at Sir Winston Churchill Pub and acting in local productions after moving to Montreal from Brooklyn in 1966 to be part of Expo...
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The senseless death of Carole Matte
Sunday Jan 23: 1972: Third place Habs tie Penguins in the last game before All Star Break...19 die in weekend Quebec road accidents ..Polish Ball and a charity fundraiser at the Ritz... Bond flick...
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40 pictures of the Montreal scene in the 1960s and 1970s
Here are some great photos from Carmel Dumas' excellent 2008 book Montreal Show Chaud, which deals with culture in the Montreal hippie era. These photo reproductions are super low quality and don't...
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Montreal murder investigations: why four famous cases went unsolved: Shoofey,...
Montreal Mirror June 3, 1999Getting Away with murderDino Bravo, Frank Shoofey, Sidney Leithman, Miss Strip 1976. Four famous unsolved cases illustrate how the MUC homicide squad keeps a tight lid on...
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That secret Montreal utopia: Patrick Waddington's mysterious Green Bottle...
Where in Montreal is Rue de la Bouteille Verte - Green Bottle Street? The easy answer is that the street is a myth from the fertile imagination of a newspaper writer who dreamt it up for a 2,000-word...
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50 things to know about St. Lawrence, the Montreal Main
If you like this sort of thing please purchase a copy or two of my book Montreal:375 Tales when it comes out shortly. Keep your eyes peeled on this site for details. Life on the MainFascists,...
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50 pictures that prove the glory of old time Verdun
Verdun, a sprawling municipality-turned-borough sandwiched between the aqueduct and the river, is posh to the west, hardscrabble to the east and is also home to well-heeled Nun's Island off the...
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The famous Fiori trial: wild Moments in Montreal journalism, 1999
An article I penned in the last millennium caused some waves by recounting an ongoing criminal assault trial involving Quebecois icon Serge Fiori and the four young women accused of beating him and...
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Inside Jojo Savard's psychic astrological phone line empire, 1995
The 1990s were fundamentally unlike the era we now live in. Many were frustrated by the narrow pipeline of pre-Internet culture that limited us to a few radio stations, over-analyzed movies,...
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When perversion, jealousy and violent impulse reigned: murder in Quebec, 1977
To compare murder from the past to today is to invite a show of contrasts. Take 1977, a year which saw 91 murders in Montreal, and 179 across the province. The victims were 116 male, and 63...
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Fashion crimes of the 70s: was the damage permament?
Mass delusions gripped Montreal in the early 1970s as consumers were convinced that denim pants with extra, useless fabric dangling around the ankles were a good idea. The pants were counter...
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Flying air bubbles, 300 mph snowmobiles, vertical cities: Montreal leaders...
Fancy photos of industry leaders that look like they came from an LSD factory, that's what Montreal needed in 1969 and that's what portrait photographer Gabriel "Gaby" Desmarais provided. His 1969...
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The crazy history of Ridgewood Avenue
My upcoming masterpiece Montreal: 375 Tales contains a description of Ridgewood, a steep, zig-zaggy, undulating forest road up Mount Royal, born around 1945. Canada's first condos were built on the...
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Urban utopia: how to bring paradise to the city
There is a path to creating an urban utopia here where taxes are low and services are high. But be ready for some tough questions: is it immoral to oppose new condo construction? Should churches...
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Colin Gravenor and his bizarre Chomedey Street den of assistance
The subject seeking counsel would sit on the first of three of high-backed black chairs pushed against a dark wood paneled wall in my father Colin Gravenor's gloomy-lit office at 1430 Chomedey. My...
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Plateau pickup softball threatened by construction
What could be a more perfect Montreal baseball experience than to smack a towering homer right towards the cross on Mount Royal? For decades anybody who feels inclined can grab a glove and head...
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Eyewitness to splashy gay triangle murder claims cops did it
A man at the centre of a high-profile Montreal apparent gay love triangle murder claims that the official story is untrue. Berube seen in about 2010A police officer shot an unarmed James Drummond...
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Condo buyers propel expansion of Montreal's underground city: what to expect...
What sane person would want to live with screaming hockey fans and rock concert scalpers outside their window? Many wondered just that when condos at the Bell Centre went on sale. But not only...
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"Holy Mother of Christ! I just saw Bradley Cooper!" The joy of celebrity...
We have all had a starstruck moment. What the heck? Bradley Cooper? On the same sidewalk as me, walking right towards me? Am I seeing things? A movie star right in front of me acting like a...
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