Saint-Raymond, Quebec
Encyclopedia
Saint-Raymond, also called Saint-Raymond de Portneuf, is a city in Quebec, Canada, located about 63 kilometres (39.1 mi) north-west of Quebec City
Quebec City
Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...
. It is the largest city in population and area of the Portneuf Regional County Municipality
Portneuf Regional County Municipality, Quebec
Portneuf is a Regional County Municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec. The county administrative seat is Cap-Santé.- History :The Regional County Municipality of Portneuf was constituted as a regional administrative entity on November 25th 1981 by a Provincial decree creating the supralocal...
.
Economy
Saint-Raymond developed mostly around the wood industry. Today, the sawmills and the wood drying, wood treating, plywood, and paper plants still play an essential role in the economy of the region, as well as the sugar shack, where maple syrup is produced. The area is noted as the home of international prize-winning cheese maker Alexis de Portneuf.First settlements
The seigniory of Bourg-Louis, which includes the territory of Saint-Raymond, was initially occupied by the Huron. Their round hut was only a few feet away from the current location of the presbytery. The seigniory was jointly owned by Bernard-Antoine Panet and Peter Langlois. The two men encourage the colonization of Sainte-Anne river valley. Four couples from Ancienne-Lorette were the first to rise to the challenge:- Alexis Cayer and Jane Skinner
- Pierre Plamondon and Louise Déry
- Pierre Duplain and Esther Robert
- Joson Déry and Marguerite Hamel
It was in the spring of 1831 that the four men first left their home for the land the Huron had told them about. Once arrived, they shared the land among themselves. They spent the summers of 1831 and 1832 clearing the land. The four men went back to Ancienne-Lorette during the winters. In 1833, the women came with them to help prepare a permanent settlement. Other people subsequently came from the Ancienne-Lorette region.
As families arrived from l'Ancienne-Lorette, Irish communities developed in parallel in the Grand Rang sector. The first Scottish and Irish settlers arrived in the early 1830s. They came by sailboat to Quebec City, and were allocated lots in the seigniory of Bourg-Louis. Harriet Antill, an English-speaking woman married to Bernard-Antoine Panet, attracted hundreds
of Irish people who were fleeing the famine in their country. The Irish colony soon built the Saint-Bartholomew chapel, two schools, a post office, a grain mill and a paper mill.
Formation of a town
In 1839, the mission counted 210 inhabitants. In February 1842, an assembly presided by Hugh Paisly, the parish priest of Sainte-CatherineSainte-Catherine-de-la-Jacques-Cartier, Quebec
Sainte-Catherine-de-la-Jacques-Cartier is a town in Quebec, Canada, located in the regional county municipality of La Jacques-Cartier, in the administrative region of Capitale-Nationale. The Jacques-Cartier River passes through the city....
, elected the first syndics who would represent the interests of the newly formed institution.
On 3 August 1994, archbishop Joseph Signay approved the canonical erection of Saint-Raymond in the seigniory of Bourg-Louis and the Gosford township. The parish was named Saint-Raymond Nonnat in honor of its patron saint Raymond Nonnatus
Raymond Nonnatus
Saint Raymond Nonnatus was a saint from Catalonia in Spain. His surname refers to his birth by Caesarean section...
.
Édouard Antrobus, the general overseer of roads (grand-voyer), traced the routes and organized municipal chores. A cadastral plan was prepared for lot allocation. The joyful hut (cabane joyeuse) built by Joseph Déry and his friends was used as a city hall. On its door appeared a billboard which kept the population updated about current events.
Saint-Raymond was civilly erected on 18 June 1845. The tax payers later elected their first council. The council elected Jacques Labranche as the first mayor.
The first city hall was built in 1903 next to where is now the Chalifour bridge. It was expanded in 1909 to include a reception room, an apartment for the security guard and an office for the secretary-treasurer.
The presbytery was built in 1846. It is located next to the church. It contains several rooms and was designed to accommodate the parish priest and his vicars, the maid, as well as visiting priests.
The postal service started in 1853. The post office was initially located in Siméon Matte's house, which is now occupied by the Buffalo resto-pub.
The Saint-Agricole chapel in the Saguenay rural district (le rang Saguenay) was built in 1860.
The red bridge (le pont rouge) was the first bridge and was built in 1875 at the end of the convent's street. Another bridge was inaugurated on 15 October 1889. The Premier of Quebec
Premier of Quebec
The Premier of Quebec is the first minister of the Canadian province of Quebec. The Premier is the province's head of government and his title is Premier and President of the Executive Council....
, Honoré Mercier
Honoré Mercier
Honoré Mercier was a lawyer, journalist and politician in Quebec, Canada. He was the ninth Premier of Quebec from January 27, 1887 to December 21, 1891, as leader of the Parti National or Quebec Liberal Party ....
, and the member of the National Assembly
National Assembly of Quebec
The National Assembly of Quebec is the legislative body of the Province of Quebec. The Lieutenant Governor and the National Assembly compose the Parliament of Quebec, which operates in a fashion similar to those of other British-style parliamentary systems.The National Assembly was formerly the...
representing Portneuf, Jules Tessier
Jules Tessier
Jules Tessier was a Canadian lawyer and politician.He was born in Quebec City, Quebec, the son of Ulric-Joseph Tessier and Mariane Perrault. He was educated at the Quebec seminary and at the Jesuit college in Montreal, and was admitted to the Quebec Bar in 1874. He was created a Queen's Counsel in...
, came to Saint-Raymond for the inauguration. The bridge was named the Tessier bridge in honour of the representative. The red bridge was sold in an auction for $46 also in 1889.
A school system was developed in 1870. The schools in the village and in the rural districts provided elementary education only.
Churches
A first Catholic church was built in 1844 on the river bank. The cemetery, before it was moved, was located near the chapel, also on the river bank. The first burial took place on 28 September 1844.The first church was lost in a fire on 10 January 1858. A small granite church was built to replace it. However, after 40 years, despite successive improvements, the second church became too small for the ever increasing population. In 1900 began the construction of a third church south of the second
one. The third church, still in use today, is a neoclassical
Neoclassicism
Neoclassicism is the name given to Western movements in the decorative and visual arts, literature, theatre, music, and architecture that draw inspiration from the "classical" art and culture of Ancient Greece or Ancient Rome...
work of art. It was built with granite
Granite
Granite is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite usually has a medium- to coarse-grained texture. Occasionally some individual crystals are larger than the groundmass, in which case the texture is known as porphyritic. A granitic rock with a porphyritic...
from Rivière-à-Pierre
Rivière-à-Pierre, Quebec
Rivière-à-Pierre is a municipality in the Capitale-Nationale region of Quebec, Canada. The town centre is located along the eponymous Rivière à Pierre ....
. The plans were drawn by Georges-Émile Tanguay
Georges-Émile Tanguay
Georges-Émile Tanguay was a Canadian composer, organist, pianist, and music educator. An associate of the Canadian Music Centre, his compositional output is relatively small; consisting of 4 orchestral works, 4 chamber music pieces, 9 works for solo piano, 2 works for solo organ, and 4 choral works...
, architect of the city hall of Quebec City
Quebec City
Quebec , also Québec, Quebec City or Québec City is the capital of the Canadian province of Quebec and is located within the Capitale-Nationale region. It is the second most populous city in Quebec after Montreal, which is about to the southwest...
. The first mass was celebrated in 1902.
Wood industry
LoggingLogging
Logging is the cutting, skidding, on-site processing, and loading of trees or logs onto trucks.In forestry, the term logging is sometimes used in a narrow sense concerning the logistics of moving wood from the stump to somewhere outside the forest, usually a sawmill or a lumber yard...
started in 1850. Timber
Timber
Timber may refer to:* Timber, a term common in the United Kingdom and Australia for wood materials * Timber, Oregon, an unincorporated community in the U.S...
was brought to Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pérade by log drivers on the Sainte-Anne River
Sainte-Anne River
The Sainte-Anne River is a river in the province of Québec; it is a tributary of the St. Lawrence River.It is well known for ice fishing, with the primary catch being Tommy Cod, , during the winter at Ste-Anne de la Pérade...
. It was then sent to Quebec
Quebec
Quebec or is a province in east-central Canada. It is the only Canadian province with a predominantly French-speaking population and the only one whose sole official language is French at the provincial level....
city by schooner
Schooner
A schooner is a type of sailing vessel characterized by the use of fore-and-aft sails on two or more masts with the forward mast being no taller than the rear masts....
.
The construction of a railroad in 1880 stimulated the growth of the wood industry. The first pulp and paper plant, owned by T.-L. Jackson, opened in 1888. Napoléon Piché opened the first large sawmill
Sawmill
A sawmill is a facility where logs are cut into boards.-Sawmill process:A sawmill's basic operation is much like those of hundreds of years ago; a log enters on one end and dimensional lumber exits on the other end....
s in 1890 and 1904. By 1900, Saint-Raymond counted 21 (mostly small) sawmills. Logging, log driving, and lumber production became important sectors of the economy.
Late 19th century
In 1886, the population had grown to 3807.In 1895, a flood caused a lot of damage.
Saint-Raymond lost some of its territory when its smaller neighbours Sainte-Christine and Saint-Léonard were created, in 1895 and 1897 respectively.
As the number of pupils kept increasing, the Sisters of Charity convent (le couvent des Sœurs de la Charité) was erected in 1896.
To better fit people's needs, Saint-Raymond was divided in 1898 into two municipalities: the village and the parish.
On 25 June 1899, a fire started in the middle of the village. Forty houses burned, leaving sixty of the families living on Saint-Joseph street homeless. The houses were rebuilt within three months. The municipality later bought a fire pump and formed a volunteer firefighter program. On 12 June 1907, another fire started at Siméon Martel's house on Saint-Joseph street. Pushed by the wind, it reached Napoléon Moisan's house and other neighbouring houses. The firefighters' efforts limited the damage, but 20 houses were lost.
City development
The first bank in Saint-Raymond was the Halifax People's Bank (la Banque du Peuple d'Halifax). It was built in 1900. The building is now occupied by the clothes shop la Marquisette.A hydro-electric dam was built on the Bras-du-Nord river in 1901. People referred to it as the pouvoir électrique, a word-to-word translation of the English electric power. The municipality bought the facility in 1914, and sold it to North Shore Power in 1924. The ruins of the dam can still be seen today at the place called the rapid of light (le rapide de la Lumière).
The Sainte-Marie hospital, a private maternity hospital, was the main hospital from 1955 to 1959. The hospital was a log home with two floors and was built where is now located the parking of the Lefebvre drugstore (la pharmacie Lefebvre). The Saint-Raymond hospital opened in 1959. The hospital then counted about 20 beds.
The Saint-Joseph college (le collège Saint-Joseph) was built in 1908. In 1916, it counted 182 students. In October 1928, a fire destroyed the top two floors. During a very cold day in December 1933, fire struck the college again, this time destroying it completely. The school was rebuilt.
The Marguerite d'Youville school, where children now go from kindergarten to the third grade, was built in 1960. Since 1972, high school education is given at the Louis-Jobin high school (l'école secondaire Louis-Jobin), which was initially named la polyvalente de Saint-Raymond.
Le cinéma Alouette, a movie theatre, was built in 1947.
A credit union (caisse populaire
Mouvement Desjardins
The Desjardins Group is the largest association of credit unions in North America. It was founded in 1900 in Lévis, Quebec by Alphonse Desjardins....
) was started in 1934.
A new post office was built in 1938.
The municipal ski centre opened in 1974 and offered 5 trails, a lift, 64 kilometres (40 mi) of cross-country trails, and a 24 by 23 feet (7 m) chalet. A tubing facility was installed at the centre in 1997.
With money collected during a telethon, an arena was built in 1975.
The Big Log festival (le festival de la Grosse Bûche) is a popular local family event occurring in July since 1976.
In 1992, Saint-Raymond celebrated its 150th anniversary.
In 1994, the rails were removed from the railroad to construct the Jacques-Cartier / Portneuf recreation trail. The trail was finished in 1997.
When the city and the parish fused in 1995, Saint-Raymond became the most populous city of Portneuf
Portneuf Regional County Municipality, Quebec
Portneuf is a Regional County Municipality in the Canadian province of Quebec. The county administrative seat is Cap-Santé.- History :The Regional County Municipality of Portneuf was constituted as a regional administrative entity on November 25th 1981 by a Provincial decree creating the supralocal...
.
Three numbered provincial roads converge to St-Raymond, Route 365
Quebec route 365
Route 365 is a 28 km north-south regional road in Quebec, Canada, linking Neuville and St-Raymond. It is the main road linking Autoroute 40 and the Quebec City area to St-Raymond and Pont-Rouge....
, Route 367
Quebec route 367
Route 367 is a 100 km two-lane north/south highway on the north shore of the Saint Lawrence River in Quebec, Canada. Although technically a north/south highway, long stretches of the road are east/west. Its northern/western terminus is close to Lac-aux-Sables at the junction of Route 363 and the...
, and Route 354
Quebec route 354
Route 354 is an east-west regional road in Quebec, Canada, starting from Route 159 north of Ste-Anne de la Pérade going to St-Raymond. It follows the Rivière Ste-Anne on the south shore most of the time. It is 55 km long, and overlaps Route 363 about 4 km in St-Casimir...
.
Demographics
Population trend:- Population in 2006: 9273 (2001 to 2006 population change: 4.9 %)
- Population in 2001: 8836
- Population in 1996: 8733
- Population in 1991: 8126
Private dwellings occupied by usual residents: 3970 (total dwellings: 5035)
Mother tongue:
- English as first language: 0.9 %
- French as first language: 97.5 %
- English and French as first language: 0.2 %
- Other as first language: 1.3 %