Walking In The Steps Of My Ancestors - Part Five - La Maison Edouard T. Parent - 2240 - 2242 Lisieux avenue
La maison Edouard T. Parent house is unique in that is was built on the original land that was ceded to Pierre Parent (1628 - 1698) by the Jesuits in 1654, two years after Pierre had arrived in Nouvelle France in 1652. Pierre is the original ancestor of our Parent family. La maison Edouard T. Parent was one of the first homes to be built on the seigneury of Notre Dame des Anges which was owned by the Jesuits. From the mid 18th century until 1953 the house had remained in the Parent family. I built that this house should be called la maison Parent because it is so fundamental to the history, location and residence of the Parent family.
There were two distinct stages of construction for la maison Edouard T. Parent. The first stage was built on a stone foundation (provided by the Parent stone quarry) before 1750. The first stage would now be the eastern portion of the house. It had two chimneys and gabled walls. The second half of the house, the western section, was added in 1804.
Architecturally, la maison Edouard T. Parent is an example of the French Campaign style. The layout of the house is rectangular, the foundation walls are plastered, the roof is built at an acute angle and covered with cedar shingles. The elevation of the house is one and a half stories. Although la maison Edouard T. Parent was built fifty to 75 years after la maison Laurent dit Lortie there are distinct similarities between the construction of the two houses. They are both examples of the French Campaign style of architecture.
It is evident that a considerable amount of thought and planning went into the construction of the house. The house is south facing which gives the greatest amount of exposure to the winter sun, taking advantage of all of the available sun to provide radiant energy for the house. The house itself is oriented so that the narrowest portion of the house faces the northwest wind which in the Quebec winter can be very harsh. The idea in planning the layout of the house was to preserve heat in the home during the winter and make the interior as comfortable as possible.
Before the property was divided in the twentieth century it was a working farm, la maison Edouard T. Parent was a farmhouse with several outbuildings. Originally, there was a lime kiln on the property. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Quebec farmers augmented their income from lime production. Lime was used in a variety of applications in those days; fertilizer, mortar and limewash, tanning, textiles, soap and papermaking. Since the Parent family owned a limestone quarry it only made sense that they would take advantage of the waste lime and use it for their own lime burning production.
La maison Edouard T. Parent was originally occupied by Francois Parent (1697 - 1784) son of Jacques Parent (1657 - 1744) and Genevieve Louise Chevalier (1659 - 1703). The house was passed down to Jacques' son, Louis Parent (1735 - 1816) who passed it down to his son, Charles Parent (1769 - 1852), who passed it down to his son, Francois Parent (1804-1889). This was the Francois Parent who was married Rosalie Parent the school teacher from my post on 'école de la côte des Pères'. The provenance of la maison Edouard T. Parent goes all the way back to Jacques Parent who was the oldest son of Pierre Parent and Jeanne Badeau. This makes la maison Edouard T. Parent house the oldest house that we saw on our walking tour.
When Francois passed away in 1889, his son Edouard inherited the house. This is the Edouard after which the house is named. I am not sure why the house is named after Edouard Parent but that could be an entire research project in itself. From my research Rosalie Parent, Edouard's mother, also lived in the house after Francois died. Edouard passed away in 1920 and his son Lorenzo took over the house. I say took over the house because Lorenzo did not inherit the house outright. There is a different situation here. According to the marriage contract between Edouard Parent and Rose Delima Dufresne, they shared in all of their property together and each would inherit the property of the other when one of them died. When Edouard passed away Rose Delima Dufresne inherited all of Edouard Parent's property including the house. Lorenzo took over the house but he had to pay his mother the sum of $1500.00 which in 2019 dollars would be $17, 697.37, that was a considerable amount of money in those days when an average salary in 1920 was about $500 per annum!
La maison Edouard T. Parent was sold to Roland Desnoyer (a civil servant) on December 18, 1953 for the sum of 6,600.00 ($63, 407.14 in 2019 dollars). This was the end of the occupation of la maison Edouard T. Parent by the Parent family. The Parent family occupied this house for over 300 years!
When my wife and I found la maison Edouard T. Parent, the first thing that I saw was the 'For Sale' sign on the property. My heart actually skipped a beat. I thought, "I could buy the home that my family had lived in for 300 years! Wouldn't that have been amazing!" Then reality set in. We would have to move to Beauport which is not all that bad, it is a very pretty location and very peaceful. But I would have to quit my job and I am not yet ready to do that. Anyway, I came up with a hundred reasons why I couldn't buy the house. Yet, it would have been amazing to live in the same house that my ancestors lived in for over three hundred years!
There were two distinct stages of construction for la maison Edouard T. Parent. The first stage was built on a stone foundation (provided by the Parent stone quarry) before 1750. The first stage would now be the eastern portion of the house. It had two chimneys and gabled walls. The second half of the house, the western section, was added in 1804.
Architecturally, la maison Edouard T. Parent is an example of the French Campaign style. The layout of the house is rectangular, the foundation walls are plastered, the roof is built at an acute angle and covered with cedar shingles. The elevation of the house is one and a half stories. Although la maison Edouard T. Parent was built fifty to 75 years after la maison Laurent dit Lortie there are distinct similarities between the construction of the two houses. They are both examples of the French Campaign style of architecture.
It is evident that a considerable amount of thought and planning went into the construction of the house. The house is south facing which gives the greatest amount of exposure to the winter sun, taking advantage of all of the available sun to provide radiant energy for the house. The house itself is oriented so that the narrowest portion of the house faces the northwest wind which in the Quebec winter can be very harsh. The idea in planning the layout of the house was to preserve heat in the home during the winter and make the interior as comfortable as possible.
Before the property was divided in the twentieth century it was a working farm, la maison Edouard T. Parent was a farmhouse with several outbuildings. Originally, there was a lime kiln on the property. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries Quebec farmers augmented their income from lime production. Lime was used in a variety of applications in those days; fertilizer, mortar and limewash, tanning, textiles, soap and papermaking. Since the Parent family owned a limestone quarry it only made sense that they would take advantage of the waste lime and use it for their own lime burning production.
La maison Edouard T. Parent was originally occupied by Francois Parent (1697 - 1784) son of Jacques Parent (1657 - 1744) and Genevieve Louise Chevalier (1659 - 1703). The house was passed down to Jacques' son, Louis Parent (1735 - 1816) who passed it down to his son, Charles Parent (1769 - 1852), who passed it down to his son, Francois Parent (1804-1889). This was the Francois Parent who was married Rosalie Parent the school teacher from my post on 'école de la côte des Pères'. The provenance of la maison Edouard T. Parent goes all the way back to Jacques Parent who was the oldest son of Pierre Parent and Jeanne Badeau. This makes la maison Edouard T. Parent house the oldest house that we saw on our walking tour.
When Francois passed away in 1889, his son Edouard inherited the house. This is the Edouard after which the house is named. I am not sure why the house is named after Edouard Parent but that could be an entire research project in itself. From my research Rosalie Parent, Edouard's mother, also lived in the house after Francois died. Edouard passed away in 1920 and his son Lorenzo took over the house. I say took over the house because Lorenzo did not inherit the house outright. There is a different situation here. According to the marriage contract between Edouard Parent and Rose Delima Dufresne, they shared in all of their property together and each would inherit the property of the other when one of them died. When Edouard passed away Rose Delima Dufresne inherited all of Edouard Parent's property including the house. Lorenzo took over the house but he had to pay his mother the sum of $1500.00 which in 2019 dollars would be $17, 697.37, that was a considerable amount of money in those days when an average salary in 1920 was about $500 per annum!
La maison Edouard T. Parent was sold to Roland Desnoyer (a civil servant) on December 18, 1953 for the sum of 6,600.00 ($63, 407.14 in 2019 dollars). This was the end of the occupation of la maison Edouard T. Parent by the Parent family. The Parent family occupied this house for over 300 years!
When my wife and I found la maison Edouard T. Parent, the first thing that I saw was the 'For Sale' sign on the property. My heart actually skipped a beat. I thought, "I could buy the home that my family had lived in for 300 years! Wouldn't that have been amazing!" Then reality set in. We would have to move to Beauport which is not all that bad, it is a very pretty location and very peaceful. But I would have to quit my job and I am not yet ready to do that. Anyway, I came up with a hundred reasons why I couldn't buy the house. Yet, it would have been amazing to live in the same house that my ancestors lived in for over three hundred years!
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