This street called Felix
"Claire Fontaine"
Angle Tessier and Wenceslas. August 29, 2009.
In Barefoot in the dawn, it is a story about 1925, Felix Leclerc spoke repeatedly of two arteries La Tuque : first, Boulevard Saint-Maurice, which led to falls, he wrote, what would be vis-à-vis the works of Brown, downstream of the suspension bridge, then the street where his family lived, which he called "Claire Fontaine, "that is to say the street Tessier.
The La Tuque Falls, before expanding the bed of the St. Maurice at this location and construction of the first small power plant Brown Corporation, well before the installation of the dam at the Shawinigan Water and Power in the early 1940s.
Falls La Tuque, viewed from downstream, with, in the background, the suspension bridge installed by Brown, which was hung a hose that was used to supply water until about 1935, and its pulp mill from Lake Parker, in the West.
Raîche Micheline Roy sent me this picture she has found during his research for his blog Eugene Corbeil. The engraving dates from the late nineteenth century and gives an overview of the Falls and the surrounding mountains before the intervention of man.
I would think that the route of the Boulevard Saint-Maurice included this section as the English called "Along the Bank" and will be amended in 1920, when construction of the Community Club. The street will then name On The Bank, then that of today Beckler.
The Saint-Maurice Street southbound, 1910. It shows the long workshop Wood of the firm and Desbiens Tremblay, and behind its silo to store sawdust, and the Château Saint-Maurice, a building shaped like a "T". School of English, La Tuque High School, which occupies the site was located workshop. The railroad left still exists today.
The photo below (taken August 29, 2009) shows the target set
at its southern end and the factory in the distance. 
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Street Tessier
One of the oldest streets of La Tuque, she first raised the name of Lake St . John Ave. is to say that the railway from Quebec and Lake St. John, a company born in 1894 from the merger of Canadian society North and Canada-Quebec-Nord (1), which was built the first station in the city.
We can distinguish very well the shop Leo Leclerc (2), the tallest building wearing a white sign above the balcony. The photographer took some workers from Brown bag lunch in hand, heading to work. We also see a big sign on the side of the store decorated with a canopy and on which there are two white horses, and basically, a date, "July 14". Basically, the mountain, rather bare, and in front of the houses on Commercial Street. A horse and cart, left, is parked in front of a small business. Hotel St-Roch does not exist.
More interesting is the work of the first resident photographer in La Tuque, "Mr. Louis Lavoie, "which has printed his photo" Saxony, Saxony, a former county in the German empire!
Curiously, today the street is the only Tessier, the rue Saint-Maurice, having homes built on one side, a consequence of the presence of a double track line between them.
Two views of a portion of the street Tessier, north of St. Joseph, from the factory at Brown. Prior to 1910. The vast wasteland in the foreground, will be used afterwards to stacking lumber produced by the mill company. We see the first wooden church. The monastery appears only on the second.
The first station of La Tuque
Tessier Street, circa 1910, heading north. The train left, the water tower and some buildings on the east side of the street. We guess the plant, farther north.
Until the 1960s, there was a railroad that ran along the Rue Saint-Maurice and part of the street Tessier. The plant of Brown, who had covered the costs related to construction of the railway from Linton, was therefore to be the terminus of this section.
A siding hosted wagons containing goods for the merchants of the city.
station, then erected at the northwest corner of Tessier and St. Joseph. She subsequently served as a warehouse to George Vandelac market, fruit and vegetables, Felix called Grandlac in Barefoot in the dawn.
Illustration from the book of Lucien Filion, La Tuque through its mayors.
The next photo, taken from the steeple of the early church (in the foreground, we see the tower from the roof of the rectory), probably in 1910, gives an idea of construction of the convent, but also provides other details that show the status of this part of town at the time: the train station, railroad tracks to the plant, the water tank for locomotives, a large boarding house, the boarding house , Executives of the Brown era quis later demolished to make way for Commmunity Club. The architect will take over the skylights. Hidden under the trees, we guess the roof the residence of the manager of the factory. It also shows the rear wall of some eight or nine houses in the street Tessier, in addition to the hotel Allard, plus an additional storey to become the Victoria Hotel Saint-Pierre, and some houses in this small street.
Mounting Gaston Gravel from a photo
provided by Pierre Cantin.
Thereafter, the street was renamed "Tessier", in memory of Jean-Baptiste Tessier, who had settled on the west bank of the Saint-Maurice in 1850. In his historical essay, Lucien Filion suggests it could also have been named in honor of Quebec Premier Highways, Joseph-Adolphe Tessier , sworn in March 9, 1914, which will remain in office until September 1921.
Jean-Baptiste Tessier and his wife.
Photos courtesy of Rejean Berman.
Several shops, establishments and professional offices have settled over the years. Among others, Dr. J. Amedee Riberdy, who would later pharmacy, Commercial Street. The Notions Ernest Gauthier, who will do the same. Felix says in Barefoot in the dawn there was also home to the band.
The White Castle
In this illustration, taken from the work of Filion, the building is surmounted by a turret, which become the Saint-Roch (3), erected at the southeast corner of St. Joseph, close to grocery and hardware François-Xavier Lamontagne. At corner, in a small stall at the same hotel will be established, years later, the barber Beliveau, as described in Felix his book as "a guy quite tall, thin, pointed behind the shoulders to the head, smelling of cologne ..."
start of the Dominion Day parade in 1915. Note the float of the Brown Corporation, and the White Castle, left, and then store Leo Leclerc, surmounted by a flag.
Illustration from the book of Lucien Filion.
Phone
Telephone Company had its first office in 1910 in a building owned by Bernard Keenan Achilles and Comeau (who became the first mayor of the Village La Tuque), corner Commercial and Tessier . This is the municipality that provided water for the locomotives of the Quebec and Lake St. John: $ 0.02 per gallon (May 1910). Cheap liter! Desbiens Tremblay and the company undertook to this service.
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Street Tessier, over time
View of the plant from Brown and his bunch of large logs, and neighborhood called "The aut 'lake' we guess the street Tessier and it is clear the streets of Saint Michael and Saint-Honore. In the foreground, the Transcontinental Railway and trade of construction materials Jos. Lambert, nowadays the company Elias Joseph Tremblay. 1920.
It In 1920 the street had its first cement sidewalk to replace the wood, while an event described by Felix:
"... a team of workers armed with spears, hooks, bars, levers and hammers, invaded the streets Claire-Fontaine, a beautiful morning, and began to demolish the fresh boardwalk ... "
"Note beautiful boardwalk, winding and worn, which was politely detours in order not to stumble against the trees, which in many places, protected from old weeds and whole families of crickets, this masterpiece of father Richard had to turn away because everything goes in his turn. "
Street Tessier and" aut "Lake", seen from another angle. One can see one end of Rue Saint-Paul and De la Plage. Two pieces of architecture this photo have disappeared from the scene: the barn stable company in Berlin New Hampshire, Brown Street, erected in the time of Veterinary Jim Monahan, in 1921, and St. Michael Elementary School.
Substantially the same view, May 22, 2006.
The syndicalist Emile Boudreau, who wrote about La Tuque, among others on the streets of English (On The Street Bank) and has published his memoirs, arrived here at age six. His family lived a few houses from that of a wholesale dealer in firewood, Leo Leclerc, the father of our writer and singer. "Before our house, across the street, there was the spur the railroad that served the 'shop' of Brown. "( A child of the Great Depression, p. 141). He is the sympathetic character Fidora, the Acadian, which accompanies the narrator Barefoot in the dawn .
A building to the original form rather
is the railway leading to the plant that will somehow decided to form little common building erected at the corner of three streets: Commercial, Tessier and Scott.
The triangular building, seen from Scott Street. You can see the bell tower of City Hall, Commercial Street.
Over time, this architectural triangle has shrunk and has become a diamond. We had to destroy part of the result of a fire. Photo: May 2006.
Wencesclas plant, back when he was mayor, lived across from this building triangular corner Commercial and Scott. This postcard, signed Leo Cote, shows a box and his team pending the magistrate. One can read on the plate affixed to the facade, COMMERCIAL STREET. In the background, a house in the Rue Saint-Maurice.
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NORTHERN
(1) This article appeared in the Saturday Budget Quebec, May 3, 1890, commenting on the report and the company's annual Quebec and Lake St. John Railway, 1889, discussed the construction of a railway from the north of Saint-Raymond Portneuf to La Tuque and Lake Timiskaming, and the establishment of a system of passenger steam on the Saint-Maurice, La Tuque Cells.
(2) In 1926, Felix's father leaves for Abitibi. It intends to launch a new business venture. This snippet, from "The Gazette, La Tuque," a page of the newspaper La Gazette du Nord, edition of 12 November 1926, which is responsible Aldor Dupont, mentions a visit by the contractor in La Tuque, where his family remained.
(3) Long unused, the building was being renovated recently and has found his vocation of yesteryear: in beautiful afternoon of Saturday, August 29, and a few Latuquois Latuquoises Communion hops on the terrace In Zak, under the shadow of the steeple of the church impassive St. Zephirin.
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Appendices
LATUQUOISES YOUTH IN SEARCH OF THE SOUL SISTER.
In his autobiography, Felix writes about her sister Helen, the "beautiful girl" ... who decided to leave school:
"She said farewell to his black buckle and convent of her veil.
completed his studies appeared in magazines and fashion magazines replaced his school books. Every two hours, she ran the post office, either to submit letters she kissed before delivering them to the box, or to receive. I do not know who sent the maple leaves or clover by correspondence, but this really made her dreamy green ... "
while digging through the Internet, I came across this column of Hobby , devoted to small some ads made me think of the lines of Felix on his sister.
A column rather Mauritian latuquoise especially because three requests of correspondents from La Tuque and Shawinigan another.
Two sisters compete: American Violet and Rose Canadian! They spared no expense, each with its own paid ad. This is not the case these residents of St. Lucie, Lac-Saint-Jean, rather stingy, who registered three!
One Saturday morning in the spring 1960 ...
... the pool of the Brown Community Club. The Nouvelliste May 1960. Archives Herve Tremblay.
Some members of the squadron latuquois Air Cadet La Tuque, the sixties of the city today, including Robert Cantin (middle row, hands on hips), and Jacques Boutin Michel Guillemette seated at right, which it may recognize, pose for this photo from almost half a century. Young Cadets received swimming lessons taught by the instructor Jacques Belanger (who was later a promoter of the marathon swim "The Twenty-Four Hours from La Tuque") and the head, Rejean Berman (his left). The Club was a place very much alive in the city at that time.
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Both postcards, scenes of Berlin, New Hampshire, shipped to Saint-Tite, the October 12 and November 6, 1907, to "Miss Cecilia Lacoursière Residential Ursulines, Trois-Rivieres. They are of her sister Ursula. The family probably had relatives in Berlin. 
It includes a small booklet, contained in a recess and retained by a small catch Swivel brass. It unfolds to show eleven "views" of Berlin, four spent installing Brown Berlin: The Cascade Mill, the Burgess Sulphite and Berlin Lumber Co. 
(2) The two following photos are taken from a book in which Gregoire Leclerc book memories from 1911 to 1934. 
restricted to family members of Leclerc, its circulation was limited to 34 copies. 
