{"id":392,"date":"2007-12-18T23:45:55","date_gmt":"2007-12-19T03:45:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spacingmontreal.ca\/?p=392"},"modified":"2013-01-21T11:25:59","modified_gmt":"2013-01-21T16:25:59","slug":"snowdon-discoveries","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/","title":{"rendered":"Snowdon discoveries"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/christopherdewolf\/2122046344\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2412\/2122046344_2b8cd78fa8.jpg?v=0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>On my <a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/?p=389\">snowy walk<\/a> from Hampstead to Snowdon today, I stopped to check in on one of my favourite urban oddities. The only sign of its existence is a non-descript staircase located at 5257 Queen Mary, in between a drycleaner and a Chinese restaurant. Climb up the stairs and you&#8217;ll enter a small second-floor courtyard containing a few shops and an apartment building entrance. There&#8217;s a tailor, a driving school and a Korean hair salon; a couple of other retail spaces seem as if they&#8217;ve been converted into apartments.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/christopherdewolf\/2122046206\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2269\/2122046206_e796673fb8.jpg?v=0\" align=\"right\" width=\"249\" \/><\/a>According to the city&#8217;s property records, this courtyard belongs to a building that was built in 1929. At the time, Snowdon was just beginning to emerge as a middle-class suburb; by the 1940s, it had become especially popular with Jewish families, who were moving west from the Main. Around World War II, Snowdon became a retail hub that drew people from across the west end to the shops on Queen Mary Road and D\u00e9carie Boulevard. The <a href=\"http:\/\/cinematreasures.org\/theater\/11183\/\">Snowdon Theatre<\/a>, an art moderne landmark on D\u00e9carie, was built in 1937; it was joined in 1947 by a Reitman&#8217;s department store, at the corner of Queen Mary and D\u00e9carie.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately, Snowdon&#8217;s history is woefully underdocumented. An ex-Montrealer in Ottawa recently wrote a book on mid-century life in the neighbourhood, but it is self-published and I have yet to get my hands on a copy. (I would offer the title, but I can&#8217;t seem to find mention of it anywhere.) It would appear that the origin of the strange second-storey courtyard on Queen Mary Road is not the only mystery about Snowdon. I&#8217;d like to know more about this part of town. Do you live in Snowdon? Did you grow up there? Share your stories!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/christopherdewolf\/2122045938\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2026\/2122045938_f5499259af.jpg?v=0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/christopherdewolf\/2122046054\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2089\/2122046054_53197aa936.jpg?v=0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/christopherdewolf\/2121269139\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2200\/2121269139_d6806760d8.jpg?v=0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On my snowy walk from Hampstead to Snowdon today, I stopped to check in on one of my favourite urban oddities. The only sign of its existence is a non-descript staircase located at 5257 Queen Mary, in between a drycleaner and a Chinese restaurant. Climb up the stairs and you&#8217;ll enter a small second-floor courtyard<a href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"sr-only\">&#8220;Snowdon discoveries&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5008,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7837,7839],"tags":[66,14,764,153,979,1467,1415,65],"class_list":["post-392","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-history","category-neighbourhoods","tag-cote-des-neiges","tag-historical","tag-mary","tag-ottawa","tag-queen","tag-retail-hub","tag-retail-spaces","tag-snowdon"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Snowdon discoveries - Spacing Montreal<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Snowdon discoveries - Spacing Montreal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"On my snowy walk from Hampstead to Snowdon today, I stopped to check in on one of my favourite urban oddities. The only sign of its existence is a non-descript staircase located at 5257 Queen Mary, in between a drycleaner and a Chinese restaurant. Climb up the stairs and you&#8217;ll enter a small second-floor courtyardContinue reading &quot;Snowdon discoveries&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Spacing Montreal\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2007-12-19T03:45:55+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2013-01-21T16:25:59+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2412\/2122046344_2b8cd78fa8.jpg?v=0\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Christopher DeWolf\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@Spacing\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Christopher DeWolf\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\",\"name\":\"Snowdon discoveries - Spacing Montreal\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2412\/2122046344_2b8cd78fa8.jpg?v=0\",\"datePublished\":\"2007-12-19T03:45:55+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2013-01-21T16:25:59+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/#\/schema\/person\/8d797e2a77c30d58d1f6fe3d915ad3fd\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2412\/2122046344_2b8cd78fa8.jpg?v=0\",\"contentUrl\":\"http:\/\/farm3.static.flickr.com\/2412\/2122046344_2b8cd78fa8.jpg?v=0\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Snowdon discoveries\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/\",\"name\":\"Spacing Montreal\",\"description\":\"Canadian Urbanism Uncovered  |  Montreal Architecture, Urban Design, Public Transit, City Hall, Parks, Walking, Bikes, Streetscape, History, Waterfront, Maps, Public Spaces\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/#\/schema\/person\/8d797e2a77c30d58d1f6fe3d915ad3fd\",\"name\":\"Christopher DeWolf\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c8aca91d7cfbd895846128d058930b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/93c8aca91d7cfbd895846128d058930b?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Christopher DeWolf\"},\"description\":\"Check out Urbanphoto!\",\"sameAs\":[\"http:\/\/www.urbanphoto.net\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/author\/christopher\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Snowdon discoveries - Spacing Montreal","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/spacing.ca\/montreal\/2007\/12\/18\/snowdon-discoveries\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Snowdon discoveries - Spacing Montreal","og_description":"On my snowy walk from Hampstead to Snowdon today, I stopped to check in on one of my favourite urban oddities. 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