The first article was published in Le Petit Journal<\/i>, on May 8, 1938. Journalist-historian Robert Pr\u00e9vost, writing a series on the Pieds-Noirs (the nickname for the workers employed in Mile End\u2019s numerous quarries), was able to track down T\u00e9lesphore Hogue, the hotel\u2019s first owner, when he was 94 years old and living in Sainte-Anne de Bellevue. In his introduction, Pr\u00e9vost described the memory of the nonagenarian as \u201camazing\u201d. Here is a translation of an excerpt from the interview:<\/p>\n \u2014 Weren\u2019t you once a hotelkeeper? The railway hotel, located on the right of the photo, March 1940 (Archives de la Ville de Montr\u00e9al)<\/p><\/div><\/blockquote>\n <\/p>\n T\u00e9lesphore Hogue went on to talk of earlier memories: born in 1844 on Sainte-Catherine Street between Sanguinet and Saint-Denis, he remembered that the countryside began above Sherbrooke and added that a windmill was located near the Monast\u00e8re du Bon-Pasteur. Pr\u00e9vost then questioned him about the famous \u201cPieds-Noirs\u201d:<\/p>\n \u2014 Did the Pieds-Noirs of Carri\u00e8re Street get into fights at your hotel? But not all the Pieds-Noirs were as wise: Hogue went on to tell an anecdote in which he locked up one of his drunken clients for refusing to pay for his drinks. Shortly after, he single-handedly fought three other clients who had come to avenge their friend:<\/p>\n I knew how to handle one man, two maybe, but three, was really too much. I had a lot of trouble getting rid of them. I would have won more quickly if the carters watching us from the station platform had come to help me. For two or three hours after that there scuffle, I thought I would die, I was in so much pain.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The interview ended with talk of the hotel-keeper\u2019s two other passions: billiards \u2013 he said he won an amateur championship in 1892 \u2013 and horse racing at Decker\u2019s Park, located on Saint-Denis Street north of Laurier. Hogue owned several horses and his favourite, which won him a cup, was named Mile End Boy.<\/p>\n Mile End station closed in November 1931, when the train service was moved to the new Park Avenue station on Jean-Talon. A new activity arrived next to the hotel in 1935 with the opening of the ‘Mile End Arena’, a small open-air arena with wooden bleachers. Boxing matches were presented with tickets sold at the hotel. But the arena was short-lived, closing in 1943. Afterwards, the hotel turned into a tavern (Lovell’s lists it as \u201cC.P.R. Tavern\u201d by 1944), and the upper floor was transformed into a rooming house.<\/p>\n Insurance Plan of the City of Montreal, Vol. 5, 1939. BAnQ<\/p><\/div>\n <\/p>\n In May 1985, La Presse<\/i> journalist G\u00e9rald Leblanc found T\u00e9lesphore Hogue\u2019s grandson, Martial Hogue. At the time he was 77 and described himself as a poet-painter and a \u201cprofessional outsider\u201d who was born and grew up in the neighbourhood. The short interview revealed very little new about the hotel\u2019s history, although the journalist called Martial Hogue \u201cinexhaustible\u201d about the subject, as well as about the tailor shop belonging to his father.7<\/a> But the article did provide a unique photograph of the building in its heydays. The old hotel which had been the pride of the Hogue Family was about to disappear. A fire completely destroyed it seven months later, in the early morning hours of January 5, 1986, in the middle of a snowstorm. Today, more than a quarter century has gone by, and the land on which the C.P.R. Hotel once stood is still vacant.<\/p>\n
\n\u2014 Yes, I built the C.P.R. hotel, located at the corner of Bernard and Saint-Laurent streets, in 1878. In those days, there were no sewers, no sidewalks and of course no street lamps. My business was in a rather empty spot. To the north, I had no neighbours up as far as the land where the Institut des Sourds-Muets is located,6<\/a> where an Irishman lived at the time.
\n\u2014 And to the south?
\n\u2014 Not so peaceful as on the north side, I had no neighbours to the south until Laurier Street. But there was a shack around Saint-Viateur Street, where a guard manned the gate leading out of the city. The gate was managed by the Turnpike Trust, which charged an outbound toll that varied according to the type of vehicle.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"http:\/\/memoire.mile-end.qc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/H\u00f4tel-de-la-gare-VM98-Y_5P056-mars-1940-1024x601.jpg\")
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\n\u2014 The Pieds-Noirs didn\u2019t fight in my hotel much, because I wouldn\u2019t let them. I wasn\u2019t always old, you know, and when they started to make noise, I threw them out. One bully, named Brazeau, boasted of his strength and he liked to argue. But when he came to my place, he didn\u2019t do anything stupid.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n![\"Insurance](\"http:\/\/memoire.mile-end.qc.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/Mile-End-Arena_1939_USB_BANQ-600x446.png\")
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