Caption
Colourful Bonsecours Market on Jacques Cartier Square has been a meeting place and shopping centre for thrifty Montrealers for over 100 years. In an age of modern glass and chrome supermarkets, this historic marketplace still attracts a wide circle of householders who enjoy the ritual of dickering over prices and the possibility of making a shrewd bargain. Nestled in the very heart of "old Montreal", where history-laden streets totter down to the nearby waterfront, the open-air stalls represent the overflow from the Bonsecours Market Building standing alongside the famous "sailors' church", Notre Dame de Bon Secours (Our Lady of Good Help) and from which the marketplace takes its name. The indoor market offers for sale a variety of meats, fowl, dairy products and handicrafts. The outdoor stalls display fresh produce according to season: honey, cheese, apples and maple syrup (for which the surrounding countryside is famous), fresh vegetables for the tasty French-Canadian "pot au feu", wild rabbits and partridge for savoury stews. Farmers converge upon the market from a radius of some 30 miles. In times gone by they hauled their wares in wagons and carriages; today they drive to their allotted place on the Square in modern trucks and late model cars. But the colour of the busy market place remains, gaining in history and romance with the endless passing of time.
Credit Line
Library and Archives Canada, Mikan no. 205928