Golden Ale in a Golden City
I have canvassed numerous aspects of Dow Brewery history in Montreal. The brewery became part finally of U.S.-Canadian Molson-Coors Beverage Co., but in 1955 was owned by Toronto-based Canadian Breweries Ltd.
That year, Dow issued a commemorative booklet, “La Brasserie Dow 1808-1955”. An English version likely was issued, although I did not find an example.
The French version is catalogued in Quebec libraries, and was reproduced in the website of Exploration Urbaine, enthusiasts who explore disused, usually derelict urban sites and document their findings.
See its section on Dow Brewery (source of the images above), under Livret Historique. The booklet is a smooth PR and sales job, yet did a good job to outline the history both of Dow and Quebec breweries Dow joined with in a 1909 merger.
The brochure contains well executed, idealized renderings of a 1950s Montreal – the city as I like to remember it, as I grew up in Montreal 1950s-1970s.
The city is shown in full efflorescence, which it was at the time, although growing French-English tensions would shadow its future for decades (some assert the city is on a roll currently).
One illustration depicts in flowing script the lapidary name “Cloutier”. He was Albert Edward Cloutier (1902-1965). A short bio appears in the Ask Art website, which states:
Albert Cloutier was a painter, commercial artist and muralist who was born in Leominster, Massachusetts and grew up in Montreal. He also lived in Ottawa and during his time as a war artist was posted in several locations in eastern Canada. He moved to Saint-Hilaire, Quebec in 1959 where he lived the rest of his life. His mediums were primarily oils and graphics. His subjects landscapes, commercial art and (during the war) military. His style was expressionist and greatly influenced by the Group of Seven.
A detailed Wikipedia biography assists to further understand his background and importance as a Canadian artist and commercial illustrator. Cloutier was also a noted war artist, in the Canadian Army during World War II, and taught at Montreal’s reputed Ecole des beaux-arts.
While born in the United States his Canadian-born parents moved the family to Quebec when Albert was a child, and there he made his career. The booklet also depicts striking 1950s labels for Dow Ale, Kingsbeer (a lager), Dow Cream Porter, and Champlain Cream Porter – the last two the same beer, the text makes clear.
The use of pastels in commercial art was a trend internationally at the time. One thinks of 1950s travel and auto race posters. In common with the genre Cloutier rendered a happy, sanitized picture of Montreal and Dow commercial structures. Of course too this suited the purpose of Canadian Breweries Ltd. which engaged him to do the work.
The images, while rather removed from the reality in street and district, especially for deprived areas, did get across that Montreal was in economic expansion then.Cloutier’s Dow renderings form an apt “memorial”, viewed in retrospect.
Below for period context is an ad for Dow Ale in Le Guide, a newspaper in Sainte-Marie de Beauce, Quebec. The town is now simply termed Sainte-Marie.
Note re images: source of each image is identified and linked in the text. All intellectual property therein belongs solely to the lawful owner, as applicable. Used for educational and research purposes. All feedback welcomed.
You’re right, the artwork from that Dow Brewery booklet is impressive. I’d take a wild guess it was done straight as a lithograph.
From that illustration and others from that site it’s striking to think how much reworking of the streetscape must have gone on in probably just 10-15 years. The streetcars are still there but that triangular parking lot was probably had one or more buildings. The two churches are a sign there were probably homes right there for their parishes — I wonder if the modern boxy buildings on right weren’t built where brewery workers once lived.
The width of those streets make it seem impossible for anyone to walk to work to the brewery, so you have to wonder if pre-WW2 the streetscape consisted of a close in neighborhood for workers with narrower streets, which was overwritten with a combination of street widening, parking, and larger scale buildings. It would fit a pattern of a lot of postwar urban redesign.
Thanks, Clark, all quite plausible. The booklet states that Colborne Street (now Peel Street running all the way north and south) was once a canal to the river. Later filled in so probably with the kind of earlier development you mentioned. When I visited the Dow museum some years ago the entire area seemed a kind of soulless urban commercial enclave. One sees similar things in Buffalo and many other cities. After WW II was the time for the next major tranche of change I think. Certainly today, the area is still quite similar to when I started working there over 40 years ago.