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Magasin général Jewett: Proudly Old-Fashioned in the Heart of Quebec’s Cantons-de-l’Est

  • January 14, 2021
  • Ned Morgan
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mots :: Peter Oliver.

Le magasin général Jewett, moins de deux kilomètres de la station de ski Owl’s Head dans les Cantons-de-l’Est, est un témoin architectural, commercial et social de la vie rurale d’une époque révolue.

 

Magasin-général-Jewett-Proudly-old-fashioned-in-the-Heart-of-Quebecs-Cantons-de-lEst-building-present-day
Photo: Supplied by Jewett’s General Store

 

Son toit mansardé évoque un style Second Empire du milieu des années 1800. Sa porte d’entrée en bois usé atteste du va-et-vient d’innombrables clients – fermiers, plaisanciers du lac Memphrémagog, skieurs, passants – au fil des ans. Une partie de la marchandise du magasin général d’antan – bottes en caoutchouc pour l’étable, manches de hache, culottes bouffantes – n’y est peut-être plus. Mais les effluves des fromages, des viandes et des pains artisanaux affirment le caractère traditionnel du magasin.

Des bonbons à quelques sous sont encore vendus aujourd’hui. Une vieille glacière, châssis en bois et portes à loquet, pour le lait et les œufs rappelle les jours où la glace était livrée par des charrettes à chevaux. Vous avez oublié votre portefeuille ? Pas de soucis, on notera le solde dû, et vous reviendrez le lendemain pour régler le tout. La confiance est intemporelle.

Le bâtiment abrite le magasin et la demeure de la famille Jewett depuis 1944. Le commerce se trouve au rez-de-chaussée et le logement, à l’étage. Sandra Jewett et ses deux sœurs, Carol et feu Jane, gèrent le magasin depuis plus de trois décennies, répondant aux besoins des skieurs et planchistes d’Owl’s Head, « dont dépend notre commerce », explique Sandra.

 

Magasin-général-Jewett-Proudly-old-fashioned-in-the-Heart-of-Quebecs-Cantons-de-lEst-vintage-photo
Photo: Supplied by Jewett’s General Store

 

Leur lien avec la montagne est très personnel. Enfants, avant la création du centre de ski en 1965, elles y grimpaient régulièrement. Sandra admet avoir ressenti un sentiment de perte alors que la station semblait s’emparer de leur terrain de jeu favori. Mais les Jewett ont vite constaté que l’afflux de skieurs et planchistes de Montréal et d’ailleurs générait des affaires inespérées au cours d’une saison qui était auparavant si creuse que la famille passait la majeure partie de son temps encabanée, révèle Sandra.

 

Comme le veut la tradition des magasins généraux, l’endroit est à la fois un lieu de commerce et d’interaction sociale.

 

Aujourd’hui, le magasin et la station de ski vont de pair. Les skieurs en route vers la montagne y font des provisions pour les repas du week-end, ou font quelques descentes avant de se prendre un sandwich à l’heure du midi. Et par temps de pluie, quoi de mieux pour passer le temps que de parcourir les allées du magasin, de se faire préparer un sandwich avec des viandes méticuleusement tranchées par Carol, ou de parler de tout et de rien avec l’accueillante Sandra ? Après tout, « il n’y a rien d’autre ici [à Vale Perkins] », s’exclame Sandra.

Pas de ville (sauf Mansonville, à une dizaine de kilomètres), peu de restaurants, pas de cinéma ni de salle de quilles, juste une campagne vallonnée et un magasin général à l’ancienne. Comme le veut la tradition des magasins généraux, l’endroit est à la fois un lieu de commerce et d’interaction sociale.

 

Magasin-général-Jewett-Proudly-old-fashioned-in-the-Heart-of-Quebecs-Cantons-de-lEst-three-women
Carolyn, Sandra et Jane à la fin des années 1990. / Carolyn, Sandra and Jane in the late 1990s. Photo: Pam Frankel

 

Avec l’arrivée récente de nouveaux propriétaires, Owl’s Head est en transition. La modernisation des remontées mécaniques et du chalet de ski est en cours. Ces améliorations sont sans doute les bienvenues dans une station dont les infrastructures montraient des signes de fatigue. Mais le petit magasin qui se trouve juste en bas de la route n’a pas changé. Il demeure un endroit à peine touché par l’usure du temps.

* * * *

Jewett’s General Store, less than two kilometres down the road from Owl’s Head ski resort in the Eastern Townships, is an architectural, commercial and social throwback to the rural life of a bygone time.

The mansard roofs recall a Second Empire style of the mid-1800s. The worn wood façade of the front door speaks to the many comings and goings of thousands of patrons—farmers, boaters from Lake Memphremagog, skiers, passersby—over the years. Some of the merchandise of yesteryear’s general store—rubber boots for mucking barns, axe handles, ladies’ bloomers—might be gone. But the redolence of artisanal cheeses, meats, and breads is an atavistic connection with the traditional general store that was at the heart of rural living in another era.

 

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Penny candy is sold to this day. A cooler for milk and eggs is many decades old, wood-framed and with latch-handled doors, evoking days of ice deliveries from horse-drawn trucks. Forgot your wallet? The storekeepers will jot down the balance owed, and you can come back the next day to settle up. Trust is timeless.

The store has been the business and home of the Jewett family since 1944, with the commercial enterprise on the ground floor, living quarters upstairs. Sandra Jewett and her two sisters, Carol and the late Jane, have managed the store for more than three decades, accommodating the needs of Owl’s Head skiers/snowboarders, “on whom our business depends,” says Sandra.

 

Forgot your wallet? The storekeepers will jot down the balance owed, and you can come back the next day to settle up. Trust is timeless.

 

The sisters’ bond with the mountain is deeply personal. As kids, they used to climb it regularly before the ski area came into being in 1965. Sandra admits to originally feeling a sense of loss when the resort seemed to steal away a favourite childhood playground. But the Jewetts quickly realized that all the skiers and boarders coming from Montréal and elsewhere delivered a welcome surge of business in a season that previously had been so slow that the family spent most of it “cocooning,” as Sandra puts it.

 

Magasin-général-Jewett-Proudly-old-fashioned-in-the-Heart-of-Quebecs-Cantons-de-lEst-cutting-meat
Enfants, les sœurs Jewett ont appris l’art de la coupe de bœuf grâce à leur père George U. Jewett. Ici, Carolyn en action. / The Jewett sisters learned the primary cuts of beef at an early age, thanks to their father George U. Jewett. Here, Carolyn puts her knowledge to work. Photo: Pam Frankel

 

Now the store and the ski area are umbilically connected, with skiers on their way to the mountain stocking up for weekend dinners or parties, or taking a few runs before coming down for a lunchtime sandwich. And on a rainy day, what better way to kill downtime than to browse the store aisles, get a deli sandwich stacked with meats meticulously sliced by Carol, or shoot the breeze with the affable Sandra? After all, as Sandra says, “there’s nothing else here [in Vale Perkins].” No town (except Mansonville, about ten kilometres away), few restaurants, no movie theatre or bowling alley—just rolling countryside and an old-fashioned general store. In keeping with general-store tradition, the place is both a hub of commerce as well as a hive of social interaction.

Three years into new ownership, Owl’s Head is in transition. Upgrades of lifts and base facilities are underway. Such improvements are no doubt welcome at a mountain whose infrastructure might have grown a little threadbare around the edges. Unchanged however is the little store just down the road. It remains a place that the passage of time has barely touched.

Quelles frontières / What Limit? Winter-Spring ’21 Vie en Montagne Out Now

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Finding that picture perfect moment with @sweenyj #mountainlifer
The winter that just keeps on given-er! 🤘#mountainlifer
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I had no idea what to expect from this trip, neither from bikepacking, a fancy term for cycle touring and a sport I’d never done before, nor from Kyrgyzstan, a country most people cannot find on a map. Carl, who I’d only just met recently after moving to Canada—I’d flagged him down after backcountry skiing after seeing his Montana license plate—had invited me on this trip while on a mountain bike ride. I said no. A few weeks later I figured, “Why not?”
The @rab.equipment  dynamic Cirrus Flex is a soft, lightweight hybrid synthetic insulation for mountain-friendly layering. Keeping you warm and perfectly suited to journey in the mountains. #TheMountainPeople #WeAreRab
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