The Westmount Historian NEWSLETTEROFTHE WESTMOUNT HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION VOLUME 13 NUMBER 2 31ST EDITION FEBRUARY 2013 CôTE SAINT-ANTOINE The Westmount Historian PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE NEWSLETTER OF THE WESTMOUNT n this spring issue of The Westmount Historian, we will HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Iwalk into the history of Côte Saint-Antoine, West- mount’s first road and one of the original côtes on the February 2013 island of Montreal. You will find maps and descriptions Volume 13 • Number 2 of the origins of Côte Saint-Antoine in 1698 and the Côte Saint-Antoine Road as it extended northwest from EDITOR: Doreen Lindsay Notre-Dame Street in Ville Marie. There are photographs of the original French habitant stone farmhouses built in COPY EDITOR: Wayne Larsen the 1700s by the Décarie, Hurtubise, St. Germain and Leduc families, who established farms on land granted to them by the Sul - CONTRIBUTORS: picians, seigneurs of the island of Montreal since 1657. Doreen Lindsay Caroline Breslaw By the 1800s, the land had become more valuable for its beauty than its Jane Martin agricultural use. Wealthy Scottish merchants wanted to build large homes on the gentle treed slopes of Mount Royal. They valued the fresh mountain air Photos: WHA Archives unless otherwise indicated and scenic views over the St. Lawrence River and beyond. You will be charmed by the elegance of the Italianate Forden villa, built in 1827 by wealthy businessman Charles Bowman above the Côte Road, and fascinated WESTMOUNT HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION by the account of the rebuilt barn on his property. The original St. Matthias’ BOARD OF DIRECTORS 2012 – 2013 Church was the first Protestant church in Westmount, built in 1875 on land donated from the same property. Doreen Lindsay, president Caroline Breslaw, vice-president We invite you to experience the diversity of architectural history that David Freeman, treasurer has been built over the past 274 years as you walk along the Côte Road Anne Barkman, membership & website today. Jane Atkinson, secretary DOREEN LINDSAY Jane Martin, archivist Barbara Covington The Westmount Historian is published WHA Spring 2013 Lecture Series twice a year in February and September by the Westmount Historical Association, Westmount, Quebec, DOMES and TOWERS a non-profit charitable association. Member of FSHQ and QAHN 2 Synagogues and 2 Churches in Westmount © 2013 all rights reserved. Reproduction without permission Thursday, February 21, 2013 of publisher is strictly forbidden. CONGREGATION SHAAR HASHOMAYIM, founded 1846 Speaker: Stephen Glass, Director of Music WESTMOUNT HISTORICAL ASSOCIATION Thursday, March 21, 2013 P. O. Box 198 Victoria Station Westmount, Quebec H3Z 2Y6 MOUNTAINSIDE UNITED, 1786 514-989-5510 Speaker: Dr. Edwin Coffey, secretary, Board of Trustees E-MAIL: Thursday, April 18, 2013 [email protected] TEMPLE EMANU-EL-BETH SHOLOM, first Synagogue in Westmount. Speaker: Dr. Victor Goldbloom, past-president, 2000-2004 WEBSITE: www.westmounthistorical.org Thursday, May 16, 2013 GUIDO NINCHERI, ARTIST OF ST. LÉON de WESTMOUNT ISSN: 1496-4066 Speaker: Roger Nincheri, curator of the Nincheri Studio. GRAPHIC DESIGN: Studio Melrose All talks 7 pm to 9 pm in 310 Victoria Avenue, #105 the Westmount Public Library, 4574 Sherbrooke St. West 514-488-7366 Series prepared by Doreen Lindsay 514-932-6688 [email protected] Admission free for members – non-members $5 at the door SPRING 2013 The Westmount Historian – PAGE 2 ORIGINS OF CÔTE SAINT-ANTOINE IN 1698 ôte Saint-Antoine was one of the ្ Milestone set in stone wall on Coriginal côtes that were created in Côte Saint-Antoine Road near Forden the spring of 1698 on the island of Mont - Avenue to mark the distance from the real by the Sulpician superior, François Sulpicians’ Fort de la Montagne. Dollier de Casson. De Casson asked Gédéon de Catalogne, the king’s engi- neer, to divide the island into arrondisse- Concessions 615 to 618 were grant ed to ments, or neighbourhoods, to entice the Décarie, Hurtubise, Leduc. These fami- early French settlers to move inland. lies found the côte an excellent area for These côtes were divided into numbered farming because of the warm micro - concessions that were granted to indi- climate provided by the angle of the land viduals. De Casson signed the early con- on the southwest side of the mountain tracts, but after 1690, the Sulpician priest and protection from harsh northwest François Vachon de Belmont signed winds. There are descriptions of or- grants in the côte. These early land grants chards and gardens where wheat, oats, all started at the Petite rivière Saint-Pierre peas, hay, apples, peaches, apricots and south of the escarpment, where St. Henri plums grew. The Décarie family was is today, and extended north to meet famous for their melons. The aveu et Côte St-Luc and Côte-des-Neiges. dénombrement, or census, of 1731 lists Within Westmount, the concessions 22 houses, both wood and stone. In the were numbered from 615 in the west to 1781 census, 12 dwellings were recorded, 625 in the east. all stone. By 1825 the population of Côte Saint-Antoine was 145 people. Starting in the 1860’s, most farms were divided into smaller lots. In 1879 the name Côte Saint-Antoine was taken by the small village originally called Village of Notre-Dame that had developed in 1874, where Côte Saint-Antoine met Côte St-Luc. In the same year, the land belonging to the Hur- tubise family between Côte Saint-Antoine and St. Catherine Key Plan used by the Sulpicians Villemarie dans l’isle de Montréal, 1685 showing concessions 615 to 623 1685 Detail of map showing road extending west as a An extract from the Sulpician “Terrier” or book of land records continuation of Notre-Dame Street in Ville Marie. Source: Old Westmount, p.16 Source: MacKinnon thesis p. 20 PAGE 3 – The Westmount Historian SPRING 2013 Côte Saint-Antoine Road in 1880. Photograph by J.B. Goode showing wood fences in front of every property and transportation of the time – a man with horse and buggy. Street was divided and offered for sale. (See Rielle map) By that time, five other roads crossing the Côte Road had been built: Metcalfe, Clarke, Olivier, Rosemount, and Mountain. In 1890, the Village of Côte Saint-Antoine became a town, and five years later it was renamed Westmount to reflect the shift from French to English residents. By the late 1800s, the farms and estates began to be broken up into individual lots for sale. (See article on Domestic Architecture p. 5) Côte Saint-Antoine Road began at Notre-Dame Street in Ville-Marie, continued west after leaving the western gate of the fortified mission, then turned north between conces- sions 624 and 625 (Greene Avenue today). Early maps show Greene Avenue as St. Antoine. DOREEN LINDSAY Map showing road running north between concessions 624 and 625 (today’s Greene Avenue) then continuing west where it continues to be called Côte Saint-Antoine Road. Detail of map from Terrier, lle de Montréal, 1834-5 Archives de la Ville de Montréal. No.2708. Source: MacKinnon thesis, p.12 ្ Detail of Joseph Rielle map, Plan of property belonging to Ephrem Hudon Jun. situate at Cote St. Antoine, Municipality of Notre Dame de Grace, Showing Environs, 1874. (sic) Côte Saint-Antoine Road at top of map; left to right: Hurtubise Road, Metcalfe, Clarke, Olivier, Rosemount, Mountain. McGill University, Rare Books and Special Collections. Source: MacKinnon thesis, p.12 SPRING 2013 The Westmount Historian – PAGE 4 DOMESTIC ARCHITECTURE ON COTE ST. ANTOINE ROAD HURTUBISE LAMBERT-LEDUC ST. GERMAIN DECARIE oon after Cote St. Antoine Road was laid out in the late spectacular views and expansive gardens and orchards. S1690s by the Sulpicians, the French farmers who had These were accessed by long, private driveways. The earli- been granted land there built small, simple wooden houses est was Forden, an Italianate villa owned by Charles Bow- similar to those in Normandy and Brittany. As the farms man, a Scottish merchant. (See the article about Forden on prospered, these dwellings were replaced with 1½-storey page 8). It remained standing until 1948, where Forden Cres- stone homes which had steeply pitched roofs with one or cent is today. The second was West Mount, which was built two chimneys and dormer windows. The farmhouses were after 1848 by William Murray, founder of the Beaver scattered along the northern edge of the Cote Road. Only Steamship Line. West Mount was designed in the Italian two of these remain in Westmount today – the Hurtubise provincial style. The stone residence featured a gabled roof house at the corner of Victoria Avenue, and the Décarie with a belvedere and a large veranda. In 1935, the City of house at Argyle Avenue. Westmount razed it to make way for the present tennis Cote St. Antoine Road maintained its rural character after courts in Murray Park, which had been created from a sec- Montreal became part of the British colony in 1763. During tion of the Murray estate. the 1800s, wealthy merchants purchased several of the long, In the mid 1800s, several cottages were built by English- narrow farms as estates. On them they built large villas with speaking town dwellers on small lots purchased from the “West Mount” country residence of William Murray, head of Beaver Steamship Line. Two views from stereoscopic cards of the house Murray built on the Leduc farmland that he purchased in 1848. “Westmount” was chosen in 1895 to replace Cote St. Antoine as the name of the village. The City of Westmount purchased the estate in 1929 to create a public park. The Murray house, which stood where the tennis courts are today, was demolished in 1936. PAGE 5 – The Westmount Historian SPRING 2013 farms, fronting onto the road.