Published in the Montreal Gazette on May 4, 2013
I suppose it is rather ironic that I chose to live on Montreal’s enchanting Mountain Street the same year that the number one hit on city francophone charts was Renée Claude’s spirited rendition of ‘La rue de la montagne’. The year was 1971 and I was all of twenty-four years of age.
In fact, for nearly three and a half fabulous years, I inhabited a tiny, third floor apartment on the west side of this colourful city centre avenue, just north of de Maisonneuve. Not surprisingly, given my youth, my memories are plentiful, and virtually all of them are of the happy variety.
(below, the author on Mountain Street in October of 1973! In the background can be seen Porto Fino Restaurant and immediately in front of it, Coffee Mill Espresso. It was that very month and year that I started my illustrious career with the PSBGM/EMSB)
Mountain Street, or Rue de la Montagne as it is more commonly known at the moment, has almost always been an attractive and vibrant downtown artery. Running from Wellington Street in Griffintown (where it was once named McCord Street) northward to the slopes of Mount Royal, the road is said to be an ancient aboriginal trail leading to those very same foothills. A quick glance up the avenue provides an unobstructed view of the legendary city lookout, with the celebrated chalet found immediately behind it.
During the hot and humid summer evenings, now so many years ago, I would sit on the ledge of the open window (from which a twenty-four year old would never fall!) and watch the world go by. Friday and Saturday twilights would inevitably provide the most appealing panoramas, what with urban cowboys and cowgirls moving from fashionable restaurants to the countless clubs and trendy discos that sprinkled the neighbourhood.
(below, outside my apartment building, looking north, in December 1974)
And restaurants there were! In the early 1970’s, some of the city’s finest eateries were found on just that one block between Sherbrooke and de Maisonneuve: Porto Fino, Coffee Mill Espresso, Club des Moustaches, La Crépe Bretonne, La Soupière, El Gaucho, Katsura, Quasimodo Bar Resto, Café Martin, and still many others, all provided Montrealers of the day with fine gastronomic experiences. At present, none of them remain, including the esteemed Café Martin that had been at that same location since 1930.
Admittedly, the venerable old street went through a somewhat tumultuous time later in the 1970’s. On August 19, 1976, ‘Le Bourgetel’ (an iconic and well-established pub on the southwest corner of de la Montagne and de Maisonneuve) was, along with several neighbouring structures, totally destroyed by fire. The unfortunate event led to the renewal of much of the block, including the construction of the St. Andrew Tower building, which later became the popular, yet now defunct, Hotel De la Montagne.
A great deal from other realms has gone forward, however, including the prestigious Wray Walton & Wray Funeral Home (Sir Alexander Galt’s old 1859 dwelling) that was converted into Disco ‘1234’ in the late 1970’s. Today, it is the temporary abode of the Queue de Cheval Restaurant while that now famous city dining hall awaits its new, permanent setting in an old nineteenth century greystone on the other side of the road.
In addition, a little further north, the elegant and historic Ogilvy buildings have both survived for over a century at the intersection of St. Catherine Street. On the northeast side of the junction (today, the ‘Forever 21 store’) was to be found, from 1896-1912, the first home to Ogilvy’s, and on the other side of that same corner, the Romanesque Revival edifice with which we are all so familiar in the present time. It was within the confines of this chateau-like configuration that I managed, several times, to lose myself as a young child.
Still yet, from charming boutiques and renowned stores to high-tech hockey arenas, chic restaurants to enticing nightspots, rue de la Montagne has much upon which young people today may build their own precious and lasting memories of one very striking city street.
I sure know I did.
(below, from my apartment window, looking southeast, in February 1975. Note the Playboy Club, long gone, across the street. Still there, however, is the parking lot in the distance)
For Good Measure 
In the last picture I noticed the Playboy logo, I had forgotten that it was on Mountain St.
I always like seeing on the “old ” cars on the streets.
Thanks for the memories, Mr. W
Nice blog!
Reblogged this on chriswrp and commented:
Some nice old pictures and info on Montreal.
Fantastic memories for me! spent many an evening on Mountain St. In the mid to late 70’s and beyond lol! Do you remember a bar named La Reprise? Big hit with the Ad crowd in those days. Thursday nite was the nite to party!
I was glad to get an update on Cafe Martin. My husband and I had dinner there in 1968 during a visit from New Jersey. It was a recommendation from my grandfather who was in his 80’s at the time. We are going to visit Montreal in a few weeks and had hoped to see the restaurant still going. We will keep our fond memories.
Thanx for the memories! I hung around Louis Tavan’s “Chez Loulou” during the ’60s and ’70s, until I finally moved to the country in 1979.
The “Bistro” as it was commonly known by, suffered a deep decline after 1976, when the PQ tax-collector can calling on Tavan, so he hopped in his green Mercedes and escaped to Toronto.
After that, many of the remaining habitués moved to Darwin’s on Bishop st., with brief excursions to the Boiler Room.
Yeah, I periodically had the $1.24 daily special at the Coffee Mill also… Until it hit $3.99 and consisted of lung stew, the only meat they could use to still keep a cheap price…
I had taken a bunch of old photos of the Bistro with my Nikorrmat, but somehow they went missing…
Tony King, Elgin, Québec 2016-12-07
I’m writing a book on Montreal and would like any additional info you guys have about Tavan’s Chez Loulou’s/Le Bistro (Cohen/ Rosengarten/Gypsy Ron Lee) and the other people who hung out there, at the Coffee Mill too.
So, the Playboy Club was at the s.e. corner on du Maisonneuve. Opposite it was ?
I’m particularly interested in Hungarians on Mountain Street or in Montreal in general.
I’m sure you already know about the wonderful Pam Pam Hungarian restaurant, downstairs on the east side of Stanley St. just north of Ste. Catherine St.
Leonard Cohen wrote
Marita/please find me/I am almost thirty.
in lipstick on the wall of the Bistro. It stayed there for a long time.
Enjoyed remembering Mountain street restaurants with help of your blog- as a child I went with my parents to the Hungarian ‘Coffee Mill’ for Liptauer cheese sandwiches, spicy cucumber salad and walnut torte. Many enjoyable meals were also had at ‘La Crépe Bretonne’ – loved the women in traditional dress making the crispy crépes with their ‘squeegee’ like wooden tool. And upstairs we would go to ‘Chez Grandmére’ for corse pork pate and crusty bread, omelettes made over an open fire- while sitting at long bench tables. And of course just down from there on de Maisonneuve was the legendary ‘Ben’s Delicatessen’ for smoked meat sandwiches and a Ben’s Special red coloured soda. These are very much a part of my cherished nostalgic memories of growing up in Montréal in the 60’s and 70’s.
Thanks for the Mountain St memories and the great photos. I was a regular at the Coffee Mill in the 70’s and 80’s. Loved their gypsy steak; pork cutlet topped with a thick slice of smoked bacon accompanied by delicious roast potatoes.
I was once eating there with a friend. We were discussing a book we’d just bought about Saul Steinberg the great illustrator and New Yorker magazine cartoonist.
An old man at the neighbouring table said: “Why do you keep talking about me? I’m Saul Steinberg! Do i know you?” we showed him the book and told him that another Saul Steinberg was a great artist. He was interested and amused and then he left.
When it came time to pay, we found that our Saul Steinberg had paid for our dinner. So we headed out, full and happy, for unexpected drinks at the Rainbow on Stanley. Also gone, sadly.
Tearjerker memories for me and my wife (both now in calif)
Wonderful times spent on Mountain and Bishop sts in 60 and 70’s
I used to live up the top just below MacGregor , (what I think is now called Dr Penfield?). Cd not cope with that hill, used to take a bus along Sherbrooke and up Atwater to avoid it, especially in winter lol. Thanks for the memories.
Know of anyone who has a trove of photos of the interior of the Bistro? …those great drawings / paintings on the walls.
And I made my living there on the corner of de Maisonneuve. for many years. I dismantled our old factory to make room for the playboy club, probably in 1973 or1975, with all the clubs on that corner, September, and more than I can remember.
. But , talk about restaurants, from early dating at La Soupiere , Continental, to Mozarts for a drink, and the regular crew behind the cash, ( Mr Wenczler) at Coffee Mill, or watching the amazing parking structure at Pigeon Hole Parking before the parking lot was flattened in order to have the metro beneath it, a ton of memories.
What memories indeed. I was an adorable 17 year old the first time I walked into Le Bistro in 1970 with my best buddy. We ordered “un verre de vin rouge”(and maybe a few more) as the evening progressed we spent the evening discussing Proust, and other great French writers . We really thought we were intellectuals !!! Yikes. We became regulars. What a wonderful life.