In a recent Transitions, the question was raised as to why a certain section of our community became known as “French Village.”
Former Town Clerk Lou Marconi called me this week with an idea: “Is it possible,” Lou asked, “that the name came about because of the Canadian Hotel located in that section?”
Now, it so happens that the origins of place names can be an elusive pursuit, especially those names that have been around for many years, so I listened carefully to Lou’s theory.
Note: Few people know our local history as well as Lou Marconi. Her keen eye, sharp memory and love of history have often aided this amateur, your local historian.
Now retired, Lou is currently working on a book (leisurely, she told me) that is a recollection overflowing with wonderful memories when, as a young girl, she and her friend, Rena, spent the entire summer at her father’s lumber camp near remote Brandeth Lake country,
The book, which is a work in progress, also simmers with hands-on knowledge of draft horses, tote roads, work ethics, train rides and much more.
Lou’s father, Albert Brooks, was a prominent early lumberman here, and he graduated from being one of the best river drivers of his day to running many large, successful wood operations, fulfilling his wish to one day “be his own boss.”
Here is a portion of Lou’s introduction in the first draft of her book, which gives us some insight of why she is recording those memories:
The days of the lumber camp will never return . . . . I wish that my children could have experienced life in a lumber camp as I did as a child. I would like to share my memories of a bygone era with young people who will never experience and perhaps never heard of a lumber camp.
So let us return to exploring the Canadian Hotel idea as the reason behind the name “French Village.”
Readers will note that Canadian was spelled in French with an “e” rather than an “a.” We can begin by noting that in the early days of that hotel, Tupper Lake was the acknowledged “lumbering capital of New York State.”
There were many different ethnic groups working in the woods at that time, especially during the beginning of the European war (1914-1918): Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, etc., many sent here by labor-recruiting agencies. However, French Canadians dominated the work force.
In these periods between jobs, such as the spring mud season, when lumber roads were unfit for travel, or waiting for the sap to begin running so the peeling of the hemlock bark (used to tan leather) was easier, or simply waiting for “ice out” so the river drives could start, many of those French Canadian “Jacks” almost exclusively crowded the Canadian Hotel to capacity.
The Brooks family home was next door to that hotel. Lou has told me that she remembers hearing that the reason for the hotel’s great popularity was because, though modest in size, it was large in hospitality.
Mr. Gauthier had himself been a lumberjack and spoke fluent French, and he was well liked and respected. Mrs. Gauthier, the former Mary Provost of Redford, N.Y., was an excellent cook, set a bountiful table and maintained a clean and orderly premise.
It would seem quite natural that this section of the village would be referred to as the French Village, and it gives strong support to Lou’s theory of how the name became established. Place names are changed often, and trying to trace their origin can be interesting.
There’s room left in this column, so let’s expand on that fact as a further piece of history.
In the formative years around 1900, village fathers listed four descriptive sections. One section was called Faust, which was the name given to downtown Tupper Lake. That name came about because the postal department objected to the name Junction when a post office was to be established there. Goethe’s Faust was the operatic hit of the day, and that name was selected for the new post office. It was never a popular name and, except for governmental matters, most people used the original name of Junction, thus named because Dr. Webb’s Adirondack and St. Lawrence Railroad (later, N.Y. Central Adirondack Division) and Hurd’s Northern New York R.R. (later, N.Y. and Ottawa) intersected, or “junctured,” at that section of town.
The second section was called Sissonville. This was a cluster of home and buildings on the site of the A. Sherman Lumber Company, which was owned and operated by the Sisson family. It was midway between uptown and downtown Tupper Lake, along what was known as the “Junction Road.” This road was later renamed Demars Boulevard in honor of Leon Demars. Mr. Demars was an officer of the Santa Clara Company. He was also town supervisor (1918-1932) and a highly respected and influential member of the New York State Assembly.
A third section was named Lake View because it offered, in those days, a full view of Racquette Pond. That name soon changed to Sears Hill after Richard Sear (Cyr), who owned a large rooming house on a height of land across from the present Day Wholesale warehouse.
The fourth section described by village officials was called Mt. Morris View. That name was short-lived and, as we have seen, soon became French Village, located roughly between Arden Street and Stetson Road and bounded by Church Street and Cheney Avenue.
In 1926, fire totally destroyed the Canadian Hotel. Fire records placed the loss at $35,000, a devastating blow since the owner carried only $2,500 insurance, which was nearly all used up in clearing the mass of debris from the basement and repairing the foundation. Undaunted, Mr. Gauthier, with help of his two sons, ages 14 and 16, spent the next two years rebuilding. They did most of the work themselves, aided by a $15,000 inheritance left to Mrs. Gauthier. That 14-year-old boy was the late Hubert Gauthier, the father of Theresa Gauthier and Chalice Gauthier Dechene. The result was an imposing three-story structure of concrete and brick construction containing 24 rooms that they named The Northland. In 1935, Charles Abdallah, businessman from the Sears Hill sector, purchased the hotel for a reported $32,000.
Mr. and Mrs. Abdallah made many improvements, including an upscale dining room that earned the hard-won prestigious Duncan Hines endorsement, and with Charlie running the bar and Mary reigning over the kitchen and dining room, the hotel under the new owners remained popular and successful. In 1963, the hotel was sold to Mr. and Mrs. Alex Kulpecsha. Successive owners/operators were Lance Galvin and Ed Magedson, who ran it as a rooming house. On Feb. 2, 1990, it was bid on at a foreclosure auction by Mrs. Albert (Clara Kulpecsha) LaLonde. Later owners also included the R and G Realty Company, and a sale is currently pending.