There's a shamrock on Montreal's coat of arms. It's been there since 1832 alongside the English rose, the French fleur-de-lis, and the Scottish thistle, reminding us that this city was built, in no small part, by Irish hands that dug the Lachine Canal, raised the railways, buried the dead during the typhus epidemic of 1847, and—perhaps most consequentially for the city's social life—opened the taverns.
By 1851, inn- and tavern-keeping was the second most common occupation among Montreal's Irish, with a Montreal city directory listing 26 Irish-owned inns and taverns in total (only grocers and spirits dealers ranked higher). The Irish pub, in other words, wasn't so much imported to Montreal as it was grown here out of necessity and community.
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