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170 Years in Old Montreal by
Stephen Lovell
Lovell Litho & Publications Inc. is as much a part of Old Montreal as cobblestone streets and horse drawn carriages. This Old Montreal institution has been at the same location and owned by the Lovell family since 1835. Now in their 5th generation, Renée Lou Lovell (president), her brother Jamie and Cousin Stephen continue to work for the company.
John Lovell (age 12) and his parents arrived in Montreal in the early 1800’s. Their native Ireland was struggling through a deadly potato famine and the Lovell’s decided to seek a better life in Canada.
Young
John Lovell began working as a printer’s apprentice, eventually
becoming a master printer, he saw his opportunity in the printing
industry and started his own print shop in 1835 at 423 St. Nicolas.
The first Montreal Directory was published by Robert Stuart Mackay
and printed by John Lovell in 1842 and are still being published
and printed by Lovell’s to date. The first Canada Directory
was published in 1857 and was followed by their Dominion Directory
in 1871.
A parliamentary printing contractor, John Lovell’s company soon came to employ over 100 people. He was the first printer in Montreal to import and use a stream powered cylinder printing press in 1847. The company has come a long way since the days of wood and lead type, set by hand. Continuing as editor of Lovell’s Directory of Montreal, John Lovell finished his career as official printer of the Government of Ottawa, with plants in Quebec and Toronto. Queen’s printer of his time, he had to make contact with the Canadian political scene in the second half of the last century. Friend of Canadian political scene in the second half of the last century. Friend of d’Arcy McGee. Georges Etienne Cartier and John A MacDonald, it is recalled in 1867 that John Lovell gave refuge in his home to Jefferson Davis, exiled president of the confederated Southern States, at the end of the Civil war. As 1842 marks the year of the first Lovells’s Montreal Directory it also marks the construction of the building which has always housed the Lovell’s Publications at 23 St. nicholas street now 423 the heart of what has since become Old Montreal. it was in this first building that the Lovell Company established business in 1835. The patriarch, John Lovell died octogenarian in 1893. His oldest son, Robert Kurczyn Lovell took over as the head of the firm until his death in 1917. Robert Walter, a third generation Lovell, ski promotor and environment protector succeeded him until his death in January, 1956. The
fourth generation of the Lovell’s, brothers Robert, Philip
& Peter took over the company affairs in 1956. Robert Lovell
was president until 1986 at which point Peter Lovell was elected
President. Philip Lovell died in July, 1981 and Robert Lovell died
in December, 1988. Peter passed away February 2001 and was still
active in the business at that time.
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