In 1881, Mark Twain said during a visit to Montreal:
This is the first time I was ever in a city where you couldn't throw a brick without breaking a church window.
Mr. Twain was not expressing some crude vandal inner tendency when he said that, what he was alluding to was the fact that Montreal has a lot of churches.
But it is inexact to attribute the city's surname of ''Montréal, la ville aux cent clochers'' (Montreal, the town of one hundred bell towers) to the American author.
It is true. Like many European cities, Montreal is designated as such.
But it is believed that the only other thing about it (other than the quote mentioned above) that Mark Twain did express during the evening at the Windsor Hotel was to ironically ask ''where are you going to build it?'', when told that a new church was about to see the light of day.
Whoever thought of it first, it is nonetheless a good description of Montreal and of all the steeples that constitute a significant part of its identity.
So without further ado, here are five good examples to illustrate the churches' rich contribution to the history of my hometown.
1. CHAPELLE NOTRE-DAME-DE-LOURDES
Location : 430 Sainte-Catherine Street East
Architect : Napoléon Bourassa
Architectural Style : Romano-Byzantine
Construction : 1873-1882
Parish : Saint-Jacques
Usage : church services and serving cheap meals for the poor
2. ÉGLISE SAINTE-CÉCILE
Location : 7390 Henri Julien Avenue
Architects : Donat-Arthur Gascon & Louis Parent
Architectural Style : Romanesque Revival
Construction : 1923-1926
Parish : Sainte-Cécile (French-speaking & Catholic)
Other Parish : Notre-Dame-de-la-Délivrance (Tamil-speaking & Catholic)
3. SAINT SOPHIE UKRAINIAN ORTHODOX CATHEDRAL
Location : 6255 Saint-Michel Boulevard
Architect : Vladimir Sichynsky
Architectural Style : Byzantine Revival
Construction : 1960-1962
Parish : Eastern Eparchy (division) of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada
4. ÉGLISE MADONNA DI POMPEI
Location : 2875 Sauvé Street East
Architect : Fred A. Dawson
Architectural Style : Modern
Construction : 1966-1967
Parish : Notre-Dame-de-Pompei (Italian-speaking & Catholic)
5. ÉGLISE DE SAINT-LAURENT
Location : 805 Sainte-Croix Avenue
Builders : Joseph Barbeau (mason) & François Viau (carpenter)
Architectural Style : Gothic Revival
Construction : 1835-1837
Parish : Saint-Laurent (French-speaking & Catholic)
Other Parish : Holy Archangels Michael and Gabriel Romanian Orthodox Church
SEE YOU AT AMAZING CHURCHES PART 2!
Respectfully,
*Nature graphic by Zlatko Najdenovski from Flaticon is licensed under CC BY 3.0. Made with Logo Maker.
Post #1 in case you missed it: