Hotel Nelson

Photo courtesy of the Archives of Montreal, the holiday Decorations on the place Jacques-Cartier. – December 22, 1971. VM94-Ad-157-014. Photo Pierre-Paul Poulin

Centre d’histoire de Montréal, in collaboration

Saturday, 16 December 2017 18:12

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Saturday, 16 December 2017 18:12

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On the boards of the Hotel Nelson

The neon lights of the Hotel Nelson light up the Place Jacques-Cartier in December 1971. If everything seems calm, it is that the night is still young. Since the month of October, a new theatre, built at the Hotel Nelson attracts the youth. It is named after the Bishopric in 1972. Many emerging artists make their first real show in the atmosphere smoky from this box to the song of Old Montreal. Edith Butler, Renée Claude, Lewis Furey, Pauline Julien, Plume Latraverse, Serge Mondor and Lou Reed are in the number. It is replacing at short notice the group Harmonium that Nice Damage, gives its first performance at the Bishop’s palace. The next day, the massive crowd is rushing to the doors of the establishment to see this set. In December 1974, the members of Beautiful Damage are launching their first drive to the Hotel Nelson, which has sold more than 300,000 copies. French artists are also their first performance in quebec’s soil, such as Francis Cabrel, Gilbert Montagné and Geneviève Paris. For a decade, the Bishop’s residence is the rendezvous of lovers of folk, rock and even punk.

Place Jacques-Cartier across time

Carefully decorated for the Holidays, the Place Jacques-Cartier has a new appearance in 1971, very close to that of today. At the height of the Saint-Paul street, in 1723, Philippe de Rigaud de Vaudreuil to construct a lavish mansion, as his descendants occupied it until 1763. The students of the College of Montreal (named then Saint-Raphaël) then install the château Vaudreuil, in 1773. The latter burns in a terrible fire in 1803, forcing the sulpicians to relocate the school in a new Small Seminary, located on St-Paul O., at the corner of the rue Saint-Henri. The remains burned to the housing Vaudreuil are backfilled to make way for the new market. Having welcomed the farmers for 150 years, the marketplace of Place Jacques-Cartier is converted into a parking lot in 1960. But this vision does not please. In 1970, the place becomes a public place.

A silo unloved

“The silo no. 2, the most hated by the Montreal-based” one can read in The Press in 1992. This silo, however, has a rich history. Completed in 1912, the structure of 15 floors has amazing elevators square steel riveted, designed to optimize the storage space. Because at the time, the elevator no. 1 and Elevator B from the silo no. 5 is not sufficient to store the grain. Thanks to the new silo with a capacity of 2 622 000 bushels of wheat, the place of Montreal is confirmed as the first grain port in Canada. In 1971, the lights in the windows reveal that the elevator no. 2 is still in operation, but the end is near. A fight is committed to open a window on the river demolition of silo no. 2. On June 5, 1978, one thousand two hundred pounds of dynamite are rocking the giant without it collapsing. The silos 1 and 2, now missing, only the silo no. 5 reminds us of this bygone era when Montreal was the economic metropolis of Canada.